10 
ippine Islands to such an extent as to- prevent a monopoly of this product by 
any one country and to the advantage of the Philippine Islands by building up 
an important industry in the poorest and most thickly populated Provinces. 
OUTLINE OF THE COOPERATIVE WORK. 
Under the terms of this cooperative agreement the Philippine 
Bureau of Agriculture has purchased and operated for demonstra- 
tion purposes one Prieto Xo. 51 fiber-cleaning machine and one Prieto 
Xo. 251 fiber-cleaning machine, and has installed and operated one 
Prieto Xo. 251 fiber-cleaning machine purchased by the United States 
Department of Agriculture: has distributed sisal bulbils purchased 
by the United States Department of Agriculture in the Hawaiian 
Islands and sisal and maguey bulbils and suckers grown at La Car- 
lota Experiment Station ; has detailed one or more employees on ex- 
tension work in the Provinces; and has conducted educational and 
publicity work. 
The United States Department of Agriculture furnished one Prieto 
Xo. 251 fiber-cleaning machine and 500,000 sisal bulbils purchased in 
the Hawaiian Islands, and detailed one specialist on this work in the 
Philippine Islands from August. 1917. to June, 1918, and from De- 
cember, 1919. to April. 1920. 
When the cooperative Government work was first organized, a com- 
mittee representing the United States Department of Agriculture, 
the Philippine Government, and the commercial fiber interests in the 
Philippine Islands was appointed by the Governor General of the 
Philippine Islands to investigate the maguey industry and to make 
recommendations as to the means that should be employed to en- 
courage the increased production of binder-twine fiber in the Philip- 
pine Islands. Subsequent Government work has been based on the 
recommendations of this committee. 
During the season of 1917-18 an educational campaign was carried 
on throughout the Philippine Islands for the purpose of disseminat- 
ing information regarding the binder-twine fiber situation and the 
possibilities for increasing the production of maguey and sisal fibers 
in the Philippines. Field agents of the Philippine Bureau of Agri- 
culture were detailed in the Provinces where maguey is grown to 
carry on extension work in the interests of the industry. Two fiber- 
cleaning machines were received in Manila during the latter part of 
1917. These machines were first installed and tested in Manila and 
subsequently were installed and operated for demonstration purposes 
elsewhere — one in the Province of Cebu and the other in the Province 
of Ilocos Sur. Sisal bulbils to the number of 250.000 were imported 
from the Hawaiian Islands and distributed to the agricultural schools 
and to the maguey planters. The Government regulations providing 
for the classification and grading of fibers were so amended as to pro- 
