TWENTY-NINTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



37 



REMARKS ON TRANSPORTATION, ETC. 



By R. D. STEPHENS, of Sacramento. 



Transportation and marketing are the important questions to be 

 considered in connection with the fruit-growing interests of the State. 

 Transportation is the most important of all things to be considered in 

 efforts to give stability to the fruit industry of California; in fact, it is 

 the key to the situation. A system of transportation should be arranged 

 and adopted by the railroads that will result in placing upon an equality 

 all parties interested in marketing our fruit products. No man or com- 

 bination of men should be given an opportunity of controlling markets 

 at will, for, in such an event, there can be no guarantee that prices 

 will be steady; on the contrary, it will be in the power of those in 

 control to give such values as they please, and therefore prices may 

 fluctuate from year to year as will best serve the interests in control. 

 In other words, we would then, in all probability, have a rotation in 

 years, regarding prices — one fairly good year and about two years of 

 low prices, so as to take away all that the growers might have made in 

 the year of good prices in order that they — the growers — might be kept 

 in subjugation by being made dependent upon those who are handling 

 their products for the necessary financial assistance to continue in 

 their vocation of fruit-growing. Such a condition would certainly give 

 to those in control great power, for the growers could not get financial 

 aid from any other source, because their orchards and vineyards would 

 not be considered good security. 



No better proof is needed that such would be the case than the fact 

 that most, if not all, of our savings banks and capitalists will not now, 

 even in this prosperous year — so termed by those who have arro- 

 gated to themselves the sole right to market the fruit products of Cali- 

 fornia to the utter exclusion of all others — loan money on orchard or 

 vineyard property where it stands alone, unless the land could be made 

 to bring a profit by utilizing it for other purposes. 



Some of the best orchard property, so considered, in the State has 

 been mortgaged for years and is yet heavily mortgaged. 



This fact raises the question, why should such a condition exist if 

 fruit-growing has been a paying business for the producers? 



The future of the fruit-growers of California is anything but assuring, 

 for the reason that there is a vast acreage, principally vineyard, that 

 has not yet come into bearing, which makes things look bad for the 

 growers. 



In the last year the price of wine grapes has been all the way from 

 twenty-five to fifty per cent lower, and the growers have to wait six 

 months, and in some instances more, for full payment, when before, it 

 was cash on delivery. 



