ANIMAL FOOD SUPPLIES 





developments, there must necessarily remain more or less uncer- 

 tainty ; with regard to the developments in any lengthened future 

 period, conjecture must play some part with scientific theory ; 

 some questions can be reduced to simpler terms, but cannot be 

 satisfactorily answered. Surprises have been known in the past, 

 and may again easily come in the future. Who, for example, in 

 considering these questions fifty years ago could have foreseen 

 what refrigeration was destined to do for the trade in animal food 

 products, or who but the keenest observers, viewing the position 

 as it was thirty years ago, could have foretold how rapidly North 

 America would cease to be an important beef-exporting area ? 



For these reasons it seems advisable to limit any forecasts with 

 regard to the future, to a time within the range of practical com- 

 mercial considerations, not exceeding, say, twenty years from the 

 present date. An added uncertainty arises from our ignorance 

 concerning the settlement to be made at the close of the present 

 war, or the changes in the customs tariffs of certain leading belli- 

 gerent countries, that may follow the conclusion of Peace. 



For convenience of terminolog}^ throughout this inquiry, food 

 and foodstuffs will be used strictly in relation to human 

 consumption, while feed and feedstuffs will be used in accordance 

 with agricultural custom, strictly in relation to animals. For 

 added convenience, the term feedstuffs will be used more particularly 

 with reference to the concentrated materials, such, for example, as 

 maize and oil-cakes that enter into international trade, while the 

 term fodder (or fodder crops), will be used to cover hay, grass and 

 green crops grown mainly on the same farms where the animals 

 are kept. With regard to human consumption, also, the term 

 concentrated foodstuffs will occasionally be used, with a view 

 rather to convenience of expression than to scientific accuracy, to 

 include the various foodstuffs of animal origin together with fish, in 

 all of which the ratio of protein or of fat to carbohydrates and 

 indigestible matter is especially high. 



II 



HISTORICAL SURVEY 



FOOD products of animal origin have only in comparatively 

 recent times in the history of mankind come to form a 

 regular element in the diet of whole nations, and only still 

 more recently have reached any importance in international trade. 

 Within the tropics and warm temperate regions man has appar- 

 ently always been, as he still is, with few exceptions, mainly 

 herbivorous. Of the total population of the globe at the present 

 day, about two-thirds live almost exclusively on plant products, 

 supplemented in some cases by fish. The necessity for the more 

 concentrated foods of animal origin has arisen particularly with the 



