32 DEHYDEATION OF FEUITS AND VEGETABLES. 



Mr. Faiechild. The prices I have quoted — that is, 35 cents for the 

 cabbage — ^inckides a considerable percentage for distribution and for 

 advertising. It is estimated at 35 to 30 per cent. 



Senator Eansdell. Those are abnormal conditions which would not 

 occur in nei-mal times, whereas the prices for the. other things are 

 reasonably normal. 



Mr. Faiechild. The savings \\'ould be larger unquestionably on the 

 more succulent vegetables. 



Senator Ransdell. What do you think would be the principal ele- 

 ments of saving to the producer, because I happen to be interested in 

 the producer. I am a producer myself. Where will the saving come 

 in to the producer, first, and then to the consumer in the price that 

 he has to pay? 



Mr. Faiechild. We will take a concrete example in the sweet po- 

 tato, because I haAe given rather unusual attention to that. The 

 wastage in the sweet potato business, where the potatoes are kept in 

 banks and in improvised storehouses, varies from 25 to 50 and some- 

 times as high as 75 per cent. In unusually cold winters, such as the 

 present winter, the vegetables are locked up in the ground, and be- 

 cause of this extremely cold weather these banked potatoes are now 

 impossible to get out. 



Senator Smith of Georgia. And you can not rely on getting them 

 as a steady food ? 



Mr. Faiechild. You can not do it. Consequently, the installation 

 of dehydration, as I see it, in these sweet potato areas would lead to 

 the utilization immediately from September to November of the 

 sweet potatoes, not only the firsts but the seconds as well, into a non- 

 perishable product. That would stabilize the market. As it is now, 

 while the price per bushel would be much higher, apparently, to the 

 grower, $1.75 a bushel would be what he is loolring at. How much 

 of his crop does- he sell at that price, do you say ? 



Senator Eansdell. A very small percentage now. 



Mr. Faiechild. A very small percentage. The economic result is 

 that we are really paying for sweet potatoes, which have the food 

 value of corn meal, not 4| cents, which is the price of a pound of corn 

 meal, but 14^ cents a dry pound, the price of sweet potatoes at present 

 market price reduced to the dried state of sweet-potato meal. This 

 is because we are marketing only a fraction of the crop. 



Senator Smith of Georgia. We are paying for the loss. 



Mr. Faiechild. We are paying for all the loss, and that is very 

 discouraging. 



Senator Eansdell. And is it not true of very nearly every other 

 vegetable? The farmer way out in the country can save anything 

 he has got if you have these drying plants in the various communi- 

 ties, if it is practicable, I mean, to have them. 



Mr. Faiechild. Yes. 



Senator SMrrii of Georgia. If it is true that by this process you 

 can save the sweet-potato crop, is it not easily possible m the Gulf 

 section to produce sweet potatoes in numbers of bushels equal to the 

 entire corn crop of this country? 



Mr. Faiechild. I believe it is possible. 



Senator Smith of Georgia. You can produce four or five times as 

 many bushels per acre of sweet potatoes with less work. 



