Farm-Management 'Phases of Apple-Growing 139 



any type of fanning. Fruit-growing is essentially a 

 specialized one-man enterprise. 



Following are listed some of the advantages and disad- 

 vantages of so-called " syndicate farming " where the or- 

 ganization is legitimate and well managed : 



Advantages: (1) Economy in the purchase of sup- 

 plies; (2) possibility for more effective marketing of the 

 produce; (3) improved standardization of grade and 

 pack. 



Disadvantages: (1) Possibility that overhead in the 

 way of salaries and other expenses will become excessive 

 and disastrous in poor years. The farmer can retrench 

 but fixed and overhead expenses of a syndicate are not 

 easily lowered. (2) Lack of personal interest in super- 

 vision and labor. Farming is not comparable with man- 

 ufacturing plants in this respect. There can not be the 

 organization and division of labor as in a factory. In 

 an orchard, men are being constantly shifted from one 

 task to another with the accompanying tendency to saun- 

 ter. The hired employee is more wasteful of material and 

 careless with equipment if not immediately supervised by 

 the owner. (3) The possibilities of greatly increasing 

 production in order to meet expensive overhead are lim- 

 ited. A frost may offset the most scientific and carefully 

 prepared program. 



Syndicate farming sounds plausible but seldom works 

 out. If land is purchased at reasonable figures, very often 

 profit is made on increased values. As a type of farm or- 

 ganization, however, it has not been precedented with 

 general success. 



The foregoing discussion relating to farm organiza- 

 tion must of necessity apply to average conditions and to 



