300 



SCIENCE 



[Vol. LV, No. 1421 



The value of implements and maeliinery is 

 estimated to exceed three and one-half billion 

 dollars ($3,598,317,021). The estimated value 

 of live stock is nearh' eight billion dollars 

 ($7,996,362,496). The total of these great in- 

 vestments is about seventy-eight billion dollars 

 (.$77,925,989,073). 



The value of the annual production of our 

 fai-ms far e.xeeeds that of any other industry. 

 It is equivalent to the value of all manufactures 

 over the costs of raw materials. The value of 

 farm products exported from the United 

 States has averaged over two billion dollars 

 ($2,062,000,000) per year the past ten years 

 and constituted an average of 44.4 per cent, of 

 all domestic exports. 



In brief, it is sufficient to say that agri- 

 culture is our largest industry; it furnishes 

 practically all of om- food, the material for all 

 of our clothes, the raw material for the larger 

 part of the manufactui-ing industries of the 

 nation, about one-half of the gross earnings 

 of the railroads of the country, a consumptive 

 market for nearly one-half of all the manu- 

 factured products sold on our markets and, 

 lastlj', agriculture furnishes a constant stream 

 of rugged people who quickly find positions of 

 service in the great centers of population. 



THE PRESENT ORGANIZATION" FOR RESEARCH 



Research has been applied to all phases of 

 human activities but research in agriculture 

 has been relatively late in development. It 

 came with a growing concern for the future of 

 agriculture, — an appreciation that as long as 

 man lives agriculture must be a permanent in- 

 dustry and as population increases agriculture 

 must be increasingly efficient. 



The policy of encouraging agricultural re- 

 search started in the states. Agricultural ex- 

 periment stations were established in Connec- 

 ticut and California as early as 1875, in North 

 Carolina in 1877, and in fifteen other states 

 prior to 1887 when the Hatch Act became ef- 

 fective. In 1906 the Adams law was passed. 

 Those two laws are formal acknowledgement 

 by Congress that agricultural research is an 

 important national question. Under each of 

 these laws every state receives $15,000 an- 

 nually for agricultural research, making 



$1,440,000 from the Federal treasury. State 

 appropriations for the same purpose amount 

 to about three million dollars annually. Re- 

 search woi'k in the states stimulated similar 

 work in the Federal Department of Agricul- 

 ture which is now by far the largest single 

 organization conducting agricultural research. 

 This department gives attention principally to 

 pi'oblems of national or regional character, and 

 engages in cooperative researeii work with the 

 State experiment stations to a large extent. It 

 would be impracticable for the Federal depart- 

 ment to care for all the problems pressing for 

 solution and wisely that is not attempted. The 

 states are in intimate contact with their own 

 problems and so far as funds permit give these 

 problems prompt and usually sufficient atten- 

 tion. 



THE RESULTS OF AGRICULTURAL EESEAECH 



The benefits of agricultural research are so 

 well known that it is hardly necessary to men- 

 tion them. For example : A farmer produced 

 pork at a cost of forty-four cents per pound 

 until he made use of information gained from 

 research and then he reduced his cost to four 

 cents per pound. Through instruction based 

 upon research and widely disseminated to the 

 farmers, one state has shown how to reduce 

 losses from the Hessian fly to the extent of 

 twenty million bushels of wheat in four years, 

 — and all this at only a nominal expense. Re- 

 search has made it jDOSsible to continue grow- 

 ing important crops in sections of the country 

 where some pest or disease was turning the 

 farmers' efforts to naught. About ten years 

 ago the United States Senate showed that sci- 

 entific research in the Department of Agricul- 

 ture, costing about five million dollars annually, 

 had resulted in saving about five hundred 

 million dollars annually. 



Books could be filled with interesting stories 

 such as how the cause of wheat rust was discov- 

 ered and a remedy applied and how Texas cattle 

 fever was placed under control and is being 

 surely eradicated and many other similar ex- 

 ploits. Add to all this the development of im- 

 provements of animals and plants and of agri- 

 cultural methods generally. 



Research is the foundation of our whole 



