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TWENTY-NINTH FRUIT-GROWERS' CONVENTION. 



in increasing consumption. The seeding of raisins has also done much 

 to stimulate the use of raisins as a food product. We have supplied 

 small sample boxes of seeded raisins to numerous expositions, conven- 

 tions, and the like, for free distribution. In addition to this, the 

 Association has distributed broadcast, in packages of seeded raisins and 

 otherwise, recipes for the use of seeded raisins as an article of food; 

 yet, while the consumption is increasing to some extent, it does not 

 seem to keep pace with the production. 



Assuming that the old adage, "The supply and the demand will 

 regulate the price," is correct, and admitting that the supply is fully 

 equal to the demand, were it not for the Raisin-Growers' Association 

 sustaining prices the growers would be in competition with one another, 

 and it is safe to predict that prices would be not much above the cost 

 of production. 



Let us then discourage further planting until such time as we can see 

 our way clear to dispose of the present output, or at least until such 

 time as the Association shall represent the entire acreage of California 

 under its control. 



As I have said, at different times during the history of this industry 

 we have had serious overproduction, for different reasons, but this time 

 it would seem as though we had gotten pretty near to the end of our 

 rope. I have suggested a remedy, and if that remedy is adopted I 

 believe it to be a solution, and the only solution, of this problem, and 

 that is to induce practically every grower in the State of California to 

 join either the Fresno Raisin-Growers' Association or a similar asso- 

 ciation, or some sort of association as suggested by my friend Mr. 

 Sprague last evening. We should adopt the best plan, whatever it may 

 be, in order that the entire industry should be under the control of 

 some association with power and influence. Whenever the supply more 

 than equals the demand, as I have said, then the price is bound to be 

 reduced to the minimum. Now we all know, I presume, that the orange- 

 growlers, the growers of deciduous fruits, and all the fruit-growers of 

 California are experiencing this very thing, are facing overproduction. 

 Now, what are you going to do about it? My judgment is that the right 

 thing to do is to encourage co-operation among the growers, to promote 

 the organization of small co-operative associations, wherever they can 

 be organized. Let the members induce all their neighbors to join, and 

 then go into a central organization; have all the fruit industries of 

 California go into some organization of co-operative companies, and 

 then have, as the workingmen do, a federation of all those co-operative 

 companies, and all unite in building up these industries in different 

 ways and in sustaining prices. For four years prior to the organiza- 

 tion of the California Raisin-Growers' Association the raisin-growers of 

 this country were selling raisins for less than the cost of production. 



