Colonel GREELEY. Well, the bugs are too numerous. simply extending here the time limit of the appropriation. We are The CHAIRMAN. Is this money contributed by the Government to these local organizations, or do they contribute their money to the Government? Colonel GREELEY. The work is done under a joint board representing the Government and the local organizations. That joint board approves all expenditures, and then turns in against the Government the bills that the Government should pay in accordance with the cost of cleaning up its land, and to the local owners the cost of cleaning up their land. The CHAIRMAN. Do you make an investigation to find out whether the local contributors have done their share? Colonel GREELEY. Yes, sir; that is checked from month to month. WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1924. BUREAU OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS. STATEMENT OF MR. LLOYD S. TENNY, ASSISTANT CHIEF. DUTIES. The CHAIRMAN. What does the Bureau of Agricultural Economics do, Mr. Tenny? Tell us all about it. Mr. TENNY. The Bureau of Agricultural Economics consists of the old Bureau of Markets and of Crop Estimates and the Office of Farm Management. As now constituted it includes practically all of the work in the Department of Agriculture in statistics, farm management, and marketing. The CHAIRMAN. How do you differentiate? You say "statistics." What is that? Is that a part of farm management? Mr. TENNY. We use statistics in farm management. As the bureau is now operating we have a special office or division in the bureau that collects and compiles most of the statistical information for the other divisions of work, but not all of it. The CHAIRMAN. Through what agency do you do that? Mr. TENNY. Through various agencies, the chief agency being the statistical force that is maintained in the bureau and throughout the States. The CHAIRMAN. What does the statistical force consist of? Mr. TENNY. NO; the county agents are not a part of our bureau at all; but we do have State statisticians in each of the States, with an office usually at the capital, and the same man is very frequently the State statistician. The CHAIRMAN. You mean that you have a Government statistician at each State capital? Mr. TENNY. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. Who is also employed by the State? Mr. TENNY. In some cases, and in other cases not. Where they are employed by the State it is under a cooperative agreement with the State. The CHAIRMAN. What do we pay these people? Mr. TENNY. The salaries range from $2,400 to $3,600. The CHAIRMAN. What part of that is paid by the States? Mr. TENNY. It is not the same in the various States. That man's salary is most often paid entirely by us. The cooperative agreement provides that certain assistants that he has are employed by the State and work under his jurisdiction. I think in about half a dozen States, for one reason or another, those men are on the joint pay roll. The CHAIRMAN. Have you a record of all the agricultural representatives in the States that do this work? Mr. TENNY. Not with me. The CHAIRMAN. I know; but I mean have you a record of them? Mr. TENNY. Yes, indeed. The CHAIRMAN. Can you put that into the record, and what is paid to each one? Mr. TENNY. I will be very glad to. (The statement referred to is as follows:) Bureau of Agricultural Economics-List of field statisticians, by States. Bureau of Agricultural Economics-List of field statisticians, by States-Cont'd. The CHAIRMAN. How do they get the statistics that you talk about? Mr. TENNY. They have in the State all the way from a few hundred to a number of thousand of what are known as crop reporters-men who live on the farms or in the villages, where they own farms. These statistics regarding crops are obtained primarily from these crop reporters. The CHAIRMAN. Are they on the Government pay roll? Mr. TENNY. No; they are not. The CHAIRMAN. They are not paid at all? FARM MANAGEMENT STUDIES. The CHAIRMAN. What does the Agricultural Department do in connection with farm management? Mr. TENNY. We are making studies of two major lines of work; the organization of the farm, the individual farm property, in order to order to grow the crops that the farm should grow, and to grow them under as economical conditions as they can be grown. The CHAIRMAN. How does the farmer come into possession of the information that you acquire? Mr. TENNY. Through a great deal of publicity work that is largely carried out through the farm press. The CHAIRMAN. He must contribute to the farm press in order to get the information? Mr. TENNY. No; he need not, because the results of this work are all published in farmers' bulletins and are available in that way. The CHAIRMAN. Do you send those to the farmer? Mr. TENNY. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. To all farmers? Mr. TENNY. We have a very limited supply that we distribute ourselves, and those copies are distributed, of course, to whoever requests them. The CHAIRMAN. But to nobody else? Mr. TENNY. No. Mr. DAVIS. They are chiefly distributed by Congress, are they not? Mr. TENNY. Yes, sir. Mr. DAVIS. I distribute several hundred thousand of them each year. The CHAIRMAN. I just wanted to find out to what extent the Agricultural Department gives the information to the persons for whom it is collected. Mr. TENNY. Every effort is made by the department to disseminate the results of our research work so that it will reach the greatest number of interested parties. Mr. BUCHANAN. Yes. FOR ENFORCEMENT OF THE UNITED STATES COTTON STANDARDS ACT. The CHAIRMAN. The main thing we are talking about here is the enforcement of the United States cotton standards act. What do you know about that? Mr. TENNY. The cotton standards, along with the standardization of our other agricultural products, represent one of the major pieces of work that the bureau is carrying on. The cotton standards work is one of the oldest pieces of work that the department has done, and one that has progressed probably as far as, if not further than, any of our other standardization programs. We started out some 10 or 15 years ago in the department to establish standards for cotton as it was produced in the southern territory, and some years after that two bills were introduced in Congress-one known as the cotton standards act and one known as the cotton futures act. In the cotton standards act it was provided, as it was then before Congress, that the Department of Agriculture should prepare type boxes and samples of the cotton standards and distribute them under certain provisions. There is a charge put upon those boxes which covers a portion of the total cost of preparing the standards. The cotton standards act failed of passage at that time, and the cotton futures act was amended by including a paragraph in it that gave the department authority to distribute these cotton standards. Mr. LEE. By sale? Mr. TENNY. Yes; by sale. For a number of years we have been going along with that legislation and have distributed a good many thousand boxes, selling them at $5 a box, the money reverting to the Treasury of the United States as miscellaneous receipts. Last March-I think on the 4th of March-a new cotton standards act was passed, and that act provided for many of the same things that were in the original cotton standards act, but had a proviso in it that made it unlawful to sell cotton either in this country or for shipment abroad on any other standards or classes that might be classed as standards except those that were officially promulgated by the Department of Agriculture. The only new application that this had to the cotton business in general was with regard to the export business, because practically all of the domestic business was either done on the official standards or done by type, which is still permitted under the law. But it did very vitally affect our export business, because Liverpool had been in the cotton buying business for a century and had developed standards of its own, and our producers and shippers in this country had practically been compelled to sell to European buyers on Liverpool standards. This law went into effect on August 1, 1923. We had therefore between the 4th of March and the 1st of August a very critical condition to meet, and unfortunately the bill passing so late in the session, there was no appropriation whatever. The CHAIRMAN. This is the first, is it? PREPARATION OF COTTON STANDARDS. Mr. TENNY. Yes, sir. There was no appropriation given for the enforcement of the cotton standards act, and yet we were compelled to furnish these boxes, not only to American people but to the foreign buyers who had to buy on these standards. The situation was met through a request from the European buyers to have a conference here in Washington, which was held in May of last year, at which time we arrived at an agreement between the Department of Agriculture and representatives of the American cotton trade, the producers, and these foreign buyers, with regard to universal standards, or with regard to standards that were applicable to foreign business as well as to American business. Later in the summer, during July and August I personally went abroad and negotiated an agreement with practically every cotton association and exchange in Europe, providing that from that time on they would adopt these universal standards and do all of their trading on those standards. In that agreement it was provided, at their request, and also with our sanction and really our request, that in all of this work, wherever it was, at home or abroad, the Department of Agriculture would be the only recognized authority to make these standards. The CHAIRMAN. The Liverpool people accepted that? Mr. TENNY. Yes. So we are confronted now with this situation: That with these standards applicable to European buyers, and with an agreement, we are the only people that can make these boxes of standards. The CHAIRMAN. And you have not the money to do it with ? The CHAIRMAN. How many people are employed out of this appropriation? I do not mean making boxes; I mean how many people would be employed doing clerical work, and things of that sort? I want to get the details of what you are going to do with the $25.550. Mr. TENNY. I would like to make this supplementary statement before I answer the question. in submitting the estimates for the regular appropriation this year we are asking that the administration of the cotton futures act and the cotton standards act be merged into one appropriation, because of the fact that certain provisions under the cotton futures act require boards of cotton classers, who will also class cotton under the cotton standards act. DETAILS OF ESTIMATE. The CHAIRMAN. Just give us the details of the $25,550. You have for 1925 estimated $153,530 for cotton futures and cotton standards. Mr. TENNY. Yes, sir. The CHAIRMAN. And we understand about that. Now give us the details of this $25,550. Mr. TENNY. We are figuring, according to the statement I have here, for one specialist in cotton classing, at $3,600; two assistants, at $2,280 each; four assistants, at $1,800 each; one helper, at $1,440: and a laborer at $760. The total salaries, computed for five months, as of the time this table was prepared, amount to $7,330 for the remainder of this year. |