FIVE YEARS OF FACT ORGANIZATION, WESTERN STATES / 



conferences have proved generally acceptable and provoked much 

 favorable comment for their api)arent economic soundness. 



The salient features of the rejrional proi::rams in the six extension 

 projects considered at the conferences in 19'2;3, 1!»24, and 1925 were 

 jH'esented in poster form at the Transcontinental Highways Exposi- 

 tion at Reno, Nev., June 25 to July 31, 1927. These posters are 

 reproduced in part in Figures 1 to G. 



Tlie work of the standing regional project committees appointed 

 by the Western States conference has lesulted in a recpiest ft)r a 

 special investigation of the range-livestock industry by means of a 

 cooperative project of the Department of Agriculture and the States 

 of Arizona. Montana. New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. At the 

 request of the PuUman conference the Bureau of Agricultural Eco- 

 nomics made a stud}' of the dairy industiy in the Western States. 

 The results of these studies and surveys either have been or are being 

 made available to tlie States. These standing regional committees 

 review annually the progress made in carrying out the program and 

 make such revision of recommendations as may be warranted by 

 new facts. 



The series of Western States regional conferences is the center of 

 the whole fact-organization and program-making eifort. It has fur- 

 nished the idealism without which any considerabh' ell'ort must fail. 

 In each of the States the study of particuhir enterprises has shown 

 that State boundary lines have little relation to economic or enter- 

 prise areas. 



The wheat conferences in Oregon and Washington disclosed that 

 this enterprise must be considered from the standpoint of the Xoith- 

 west, which includes Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and Montana. In 

 Idaho the poultry committee studies l)rought out the necessity of 

 intimate knowledge of Los Angeles market conditions. In Xe^•ada 

 the State and irrigation-])roject conferences developed that the facts 

 relating to California were even more important than the facts relat- 

 ing to Nevada. Mucii reenforcement has already been drawn from 

 the studies made in California. The prune committees in Oregon 

 at once found that the prune enterpri.se was a joint one with Wash- 

 ington, California, and Idaho. 



These illustrations j)oint to the need of regional consideration and 

 regional conferences. I'ltimately the State and county extension 

 l)rograms must be based on a knowledge of the whole situation a> it 

 allects tlie enterj)rise, and not simply on its local manifestations. 

 There is no political or administrative overhead on a regional basis 

 with personnel and fimds to carry on, .so drafts are being made on 

 the Federal DepHrtmeiit of Agriculture and other Federal depart- 

 ments. As the I'act-fMganization elFort proceeds such re(|uesls in- 

 crease and already have brought into existence a lu'W type of project, 

 in which a l)ureau of (he Federal Department of Agriculture and 

 several State exi)ei-iment stations and exteiiNiou services cooi)erate. as 

 in the range-livestock survey. 



