130 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 
wiped out and the consumer left at the 
mercy of the importer. 
If sixty-five cents a box is so meagre 
a profit for the importer that it is not at¬ 
tractive, and he had it all his own way, 
without the home competition to keep his 
prices down, what amount of profit, do 
you suppose, would he demand on his 
goods if he could set his own price, with¬ 
out domestic competition to keep it with¬ 
in reasonable limits? 
GREED, NOT TARIFF, ^PROHIBITS.” 
These figures plainly show that the 
prohibition against imported oranges is 
that of greed of the importer for inor¬ 
dinate profit, rather than the very mod¬ 
est amount of tariff now existing and 
requested by the domestic producer. 
WILL THE FLORIDA CITRUS INDUSTRY 
EVER BE ABLE TO OPERATE WITH A 
SUBSTANTIAL REDUCTION OF 
THE PRESENT TARIFF? 
My opinion is that if all goes well, 
and no such disasters occur within the 
next five years as did occur in 1894-5 in 
Florida, that in five years’ time the Flor¬ 
ida citrus industry will have become suf¬ 
ficiently developed to permit the cutting 
of the present tariff in half without se¬ 
riously disturbing the future of the in¬ 
dustry, and my reason for this is that 
economies can be shown as follows: 
ECONOMIES. 
First — 
At the present time ? the average cost 
to produce a box of oranges on the trees 
at maturity is fifty cents a box, and the 
average profit necessary for the grower 
is fifty cents a box, making a total of one 
dollar per box on the trees for mature 
fruit. The present production is slight¬ 
ly less than one hundred boxes to the ^ 
acre, and the fifty cents a box net profit 
on the trees to the grower will show a 
net profit of fifty dollars per acre for the 
grower, or just about the rent per acre 
in Valencia. 
The normal, natural, average bearing 
capacity of a fully matured grove, prop¬ 
erly tended for, should be three hundred 
boxes to the acre. This amount of fruit 
per acre can be produced in Florida at a 
cost of thirty cents a box ; and if in ad¬ 
dition to this thirty cents a box cost, the 
grower had a net profit of twenty-five 
cents a box, it would show him seventy- 
five dollars per acre net. And thirty 
cents a box cost added to the twenty-five 
cents a box profit would show a total 
price of fifty-five cents a box on the trees 
that the grower should receive for his 
fruit. 
This, in itself, would mean a reduction 
of forty-five cents a box from the pres¬ 
ent amount that the grower must have 
to show a net profit of fifty dollars per 
acre, and the forty-five cents a box so 
saved could be taken directly from the 
present tariff without injury to, or at 
least without destruction of the industry, 
and without cutting the existing rate of 
wages. 
4 
Second — 
It costs much less to pick a crop of 
fruit that will run three hundred boxes 
to the acre than one that will run one 
hundred boxes to the acre, for the fruit 
is thicker on the trees, and more boxes 
