4—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, March 12, 1966
From Where We Stand...
The Tobacco Quota Question
Did you sell your tobacco yet this
year? If so, did you make any money
on the crop’’ To a great extent that
question seems to depend on what value
\ou place on your labor. The greatest
single cost item in tobacco production is
labor. But there are others seed, fer
tilizer, chemicals, and the cost of the
land which could be used for other
crops.
Tobacco is a traditional crop in
Lancaster County. We have the grow
ers and we have the buyers This is
usually all that is needed to establish
a satisfactory market, assuming, as the
economists say, “all other factors are
equal” Equal to what, we don't know.
This writer has noted a general feel
ing of dissatisfaction over the past few
jears, on the part of the growers in
particular. Many claim they are com
pletely at the mercy of the buyers, and
that they are not being adequately paid
for their labors.
The tobacco market is a unique
thing There is no national price scale
in evidence. How the price is arrived
at no one seems to know. It might al
most be an imaginary number pulled
out of an imaginary hat But somehow,
each year, there it is Each grower has
the choice of accepting or rejecting it
Generally, he needs the cash to pay
other bills, so he accepts it Tobacco is
not like any of the other products you
raise on the farm Either you sell it
here, or you eat it, there is no other
place to go with it
Each year Lancaster County grow
ers produce approximately $lO million
worth of tobacco This makes it a
vitally important crop by any measure
ment
Every three years the farmers are
offered a chance to change the way in
which they market their tobacco, they
are offered the opportunity of a guaran
teed price for their product As regular
ly as clockwork, every three years they
reject the offer, overwhelmingly. And
the situation remains as before.
A new group in the county is now
demanding that that situation be chang
ed They want a referendum every year,
assuming quotas are voted down in each
preceding year. They want Lancaster
County growers to accept a quota system
and to put a price floor under the to
bacco market To bring this about they
need 2000 signatures on a petition for
an off-year referendum That is the
first step They want a central market
ing agency, such as Agway, to handle
all the tobacco They want to eliminate
the individual buyer-seller arrangement
which they feel is the crux of our mar
keting problem
We have met the leadership of this
new association Tn-County Tobacco
Growers and believe they are sin-
Farm Calendar
iVlai h 14 1 pm Lancas
tei Countv Swine Piodu
ctis Spring Catcass Show
Lancaster Stock Yaids
-—7 10 p m 4-H Avibhne-
Jeisrv Dair\ Club reotgan
ization meeting at F'aim
Ctedu Bldg W Roseville
Rd Lancaster
—7 3u p m Lancaster
County SWCD directors
meet at Courthouse Lan-
t astei
—S p m Cattle Feeder
Meeting at Milton Biecht
School Lititz Pike Lan-
c a sici
Match [A 10 10 am
Dam PieedC] Institute at
Cnei n--e\ Siles Patihon
—7 10 pin Lincoln 4-H
Ccininu ii 1 1 \ Club teoigan
ization ineetms; a Mt Airt
Fne Hall
Manoi YFA class
Manoi High
—S p m
at Penn
School subiec-t “Summer
anniMl glasses" speaker
cere and honorable men. Their member
ship is not looking for glory; they are
not looking for a free handout; and they
are not looking for a seat on the govern
ment “something-for-nothing” express.
They are searching for a solution to a
common problem. They are, in fact,
fighting for the economic survival of
the tobacco grower in Lancaster County.
Whether their approach is right or
wrong is for you to say. We are interest
ed because we see people working for a
solution to a problem instead of blindly
accepting it. And, tobacco raisers,
whether or not you recognize it, you
have a serious problem.
Perhaps a countywide “clinic” to
thoroughly air and study all angles
of this situation might be the first step
to be taken here The USDA’s Consum
er & Marketing Service can help or
ganize and stage such a clinic. It has
been done in examining the marketing
ills of other commodities.
★ ★
HOGWASH!
“NFO bargaining agreements are
100 percent responsible for today’s hog
price”. This statement was made by a
Minnesota businessman at an annual
National Farmers Organization (NFO)
meeting in Henry County, Indiana,
recently and reported by a mid-western
farm paper
That the statement was not made
in jest is evident from the rest of the
speaker’s talk He explained that NFO
agreements with two of the nation’s
largest packers that process 45 percent
of the hog supply, plus contracts with
smaller packers, has forced the hog
price rise
So it is the NFO. single-handedly,
that has caused this dramatic rise in
hog prices! . . . “not the scarcity of
hogs as economists and newspapers
lead all to believe,” he says.
The article does not spell out what
business the gentleman from Minnesota
is engaged in, but we seriously hope
that he pays closer attention to what
is going on in his field than he ap
parently does to the supply-demand pic
ture in agriculture.
Hog statistics have clearly spelled
out their shrinking supply story for
well over a year; economists and news
papers didn’t just dream up the fact
that fewer hogs were being raised all
during 1965, they merely reported it.
If this uninformed speaker had
said that NFO contracts controlling
hog production had played a part in the
'price rise, and backed up his statement
with facts and figures, no one could dis
pute that opinion But such a flagrant
display of pure fantasy .. to say that
no other factors but NFO were respon
sible . can not go by unchallenged
4-H GI'KRXSKY CIA 15
ELECTS ’(id OFFICERS
Wawie Denlinger was elect
ed piestdent ol the Lancas
tei Countv Oueinsey 4-H
Club during its reorganiza
tion meeting at the Jiome of
Rajmond Witmer Willow
Street R 1
Othei new officers ate Earl
Mull vice president, Cynthia
Oluis N’tssley, A H Hoff
man Seed Co
March 17 7 30 pm , Lan
tastei County Poultry
Assn annual meeting at
Fann Credit Bldg \V
Roseville Rd Lancaster,
Maich IS C 30 pm, Lan
castei Comit\ Swine Pio
diueis Assn annual ban
quet meeting at the Blue
Ball Fue Hall
—() n p'in Cloistei FFA
Chaptc-i annual patent-son
lanqnet at Ephrhta High
School cafetena
—7 p m Manheim YFA
Chapter annual banquet at
Peniyn Fue Hall.
★ . ★
Bal'mer, seciet'aiy; Steve
O Connoi tieasuiei Nelson
Landis news reporter, Pete
Witrner and Donald Brene
man, song leadeis, Louise
Ann and Ruth Bieneman and
Cindy Brenem’an game lead
eis, and Wayne Denhnger
coitaty council
Lancaster Farming
Lancaster County’s Own Farm
Weekly
P. 0 Box 266 - Lititz, Pa.
17543
Offices:
22 E. Main St.
Lititz, Pa 17543
Phone - Lancaster
394-3047 or
Lititz 626-2191
Don Timmons, Editor
Robert G. Campbell, Adver
tising Director
Subscnption price—s 2 per
year in Lancaster County;
$3 eisewheie.
Established November 4,
1955 Published every Satur
day by Lancaster Farming, Lit
itz, Pa.
h7UE / ;ourM. You <an’t rimtyour.ajn
" - C~) rr\ r-j trrj MlO them. But what to do about
’ ' \ ) Si) I) Sj J tiJ s r%. other*? I» there a difference be-
"I iween a Christian and an un
: SPEAKS Christian way of looking at,,
.. v*-- 7 " thinking about and dealing with.
i ' " ...R , ‘people? There certainlyls. The
| Int*m*li*n*! bnilotm | ~,J Christian and only the Christian!
j-.J/jlmt- 1 '" »riously the divine Com-
T- m'lilMirlitiiif Wi'iillllliliM mandment, Love thy neighbor as
thyself. We must add: The Jew
also, for the very commandment
of love is one we find in the Old
Testament first (Leviticus 19:18).
True love not sloppy '
c«cit|r«uMi Scn.Kjr. Romons 12 321 i3i io, This commandment is Quoted
Eph«ilons 425 32 I P»'«r 47 11 James 2 M 7. ( n flje NeW Testament IOOTC often
D.v.h.n.. «•«(..• w. i2-2i pnd more emphatically than any
We really didn’t need the popu- o ther. Jesus, Paul, Peter, James,
lation explosion to rub it into our j o h n , - how different they all are!
heads that there are a lot more yet every one of them headlines
people in this world than we can and insists on love as the first
very well manage to live with, duty, the Christians all-inclusive
Still it’s our business to live so duty to man. This can be mis
far as it lies in us, to live at peace understood. “Love” - what is
with all men. Our called by that name-is sometimes
Christian duty used by fuzzy-minded and mealy
and our Christ- mouthed people to mean some
ian business, ihjng as shapeless as a fog in a
that is. People bog, as meaningless as the love
wh o are not son g Q f a sick bullfrog, as elusive
Christians have as a wet ghost. Love, or what is l
the same duty to ca u ed 'Jove, can be reduced to a
others, only they n j ce word. Love as it comes to us
Yourself And...
Lesson for March 13,1966
don’t admit it. on the airwaves to the accompa-
Dr. Foreman One of these n inient of an electric guitar canb«!
modern pagans wrote: "The more than noise profan
world is my orange and I intend mg the very love the crooner
to squeeze it.” Another one, the w hines about. Real authentic
famous playwright Sartre, said take-no-suhstitute love for our
something to this effect: Hell is neighbors (next door or around
the existence of other people. f ne world) is a solid unsentimen-
Every other person besides your- tal thing.
self is a threat to you, personally.
He lessens your available good, Love IS CODCSrn
fame, pleasure. The more he or Love is active self-sacrificing
they get out of the world the less concern foi the vellare of those
there is left for you. who are loved. Love of a inanfor
Others
It is obvious that we cannot (.he army, or helping reduce air
live in this world-and never could pollution, or electing intelligent!
have lived in it—without thinking congressmen. Love of a parent or
about other people, some way or tea-ViC-r for students or their own
other. That is why any form of -Inldren does not mean indulging
religion which puts it into purely >h?m in roonopoLzmg the tele
personal, singular, individual, phone or the family car. Concern
terms, ignores the basic facts of, “or the welfare of distant people
life. Religion has a theoretical i«ay in southeast Asia-may mean
side-what we believe; it also has jwe have to keep on with a nasty
a practical side—'what we do, or j war we did not want. Concern for
ought to do. The Christian reli-|the true welfare of others can take
gion in particular is not a "flight, many forms,
of the Alone to the Alone;” it is . „ ~ ~ . „
, iv - . •utlinM b/ ** Divisian
IHUCII IXIOrC thsn whflt m&U does ( Chr*<tt«n EtSucttun, Nititml Cawd th*
with his solitariness. It is th# ch«rch« chmt ■» th* u. s. a. s?
practical answer to the question, c*™**r*~*™») J
"What do you put after Yourself
and . . . ?” Yourself and God, of
course. But that is another story.
After God, who else? Others, of
Now Is The Time ...
By Max Smith, Lancaster County Agent
To Plant Spring Oats Early
Local growers who are planning to sow
spring oats should make every effoit to get
them into the ground the last 10 days of
Maich (if weathei permits) or by the middle
of April Heie in southeastern Pennsylvania
spring oats seeded as early as possible will
outyield late April or May seedings
To Go Light With Nitrogen On Wheat
Wheat growers are planning to seed the
area down to alfalfa or clover should be
cautious about making a heavy nitrogen appli
cation on the wheat this spring On fertile
soil this application may not be needed On
lighter soils, or on soils of sand, shale, or
gravel, about 25 pounds of nitrogen per acre SMITH
is the limit To much nitrogen will result in heavier growth
of the wheat plant and extra shading and competition for the
small legume seedings.
To Evaluate “Medicare”
Health Program
gram Th e purpose of “medi*
caie” is to help alleviate,
foi the aged, the burden of
All pei sons &5 oj older heavy medical expenses dtir.
nvay want to investigate the in g a period when inconi*
benefits ot the “medicare” JS generally lower The de'acU
program, many rural people i ine f ol sign-up this year is
can be assisted in this pro- March 31.
GROWTH IX
NIRSKUY INDUSTRY
D'u'o i ng
the
past
ades, the amount o f nuisery The Penn State Unuversity
stock being giown and sold g ol i
in 'Pennsylvania alone has in- , .
ci eased 50 0 peicent By al- a '
m'os't any yaidstiok, this m- rom
dmstry can be 'characterised soil samples fl'ist yeaf
as one of 'past dynamic 0 f opeaation to over 70,0’00
gioivth. pith prospects of t[l , Js p&st vear- ,
continued future .growth.
lus country may he shown in
honest tax return, oi enlistment
70,000 SOIL SAMPLES
TESTED AT PENN
STATE LABORATORY
two dec-
Testing Program
in 19152, has
initi
leaped
7,00i0
analyses of
the