—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, November 25, 1972
6
USDA
Capping months of intensive
research, five marketing teams
have presented their findings to
Agriculture Secretary Butz.
The Secretary named the
teams last February as part of a
new effort to life farm income.
Their assignment: recommend
solutions for the problems com
fronting five major com
modities—apples, eggs, pork,
canning peaches, and potatoes.
The study groups were headed
by USDA people and included
State, university, extension,
farm, and industry represen
tatives.
The teams based their reports
on interviews, conferences, and
consultation with growers,
processors, agri-businessmen,
trade experts, State and federal
personnel, and other interested
members of the commodity in
dustries.
Some of the major problems
uncovered by the teams were
common to all the commodities.
Oversupply and unstable
volumes and prices loomed
largest.
Surpluses have resulted mainly
from failure of the commodity
industries to find markets for
increased production, caused in
part by the continued entry of
new producers. For some of the
commodities, the surplus
dilemma has deepened with
recent losses of export markets.
Similarly, lack of stability in
some commodities has stemmed
from entry of new producers and
accelerated output when prices
are favorable, and a pulling out
when prices drop.
Marketing Teams
The marketing teams
recognized that boosting per
capita consumption poses one of
the biggest challenges to each
industry. All teams saw the need
for better organization and
coordinated commodity
promotion programs.
Team members found that past
promotional efforts were often
fragmented and missed their
mark. One report noted that
State Potato Production
Down 29 pet. from ’7l
The Pennsylvania potato
harvest was about 95 percent
complete on November 1 and the
estimate for the year is now
5,550,000 hundredweight (cwt.),
according to the Crop Reporting
Service, a joint service of the
Pennsylvania and U.S. Depart
ments of Agriculture.
Acreage, yield and total
production are all down sharply
from a year earlier with this
year’s results reflecting heavily
the ravages of tropical storm
Agnes.
The total production was off 29
percent from last year and 33
percent from 1970. Total acres
planted dropped 5,500 to 30,000
and the yield (per acre) at 185
cwt. was reduced by 35 cwt. from
1971. .
Production of fall potatoes was
off throughout the United States
with the November 1 estimate
now placed at 234,571,000 a
promotional materials in some
cases seemed to be designed to
“impress industry colleagues”
rather than influence consumers.
The teams further recom
mended that promotional efforts
place special emphasis on
reaching the youth market.
Several of the study groups added
that promotion programs should
focus on the expanding market
for food eaten away from home.
decline of eight percent from
1971.
Pennsylvania is ranked 12th in
the U.S. in potato production with
the value of last year’s harvest
placed at $522,046,000. Lehigh,
Erie and Cambria County ac
count for 30 percent of the total.
Book Elected
By Interstate
Roy H. Book, Bonks Rl, was
elected a director of the Inter-
State Milk Producers
Cooperative at a recent meeting
in Philadelphia. He is one of 24
directors from Pennsylvania,
New Jersey, Delaware and
Maryland representing some 3000
dairy farmers.
Book will represent the
cooperative’s sixth district at all
board meetings.
Unpublicized American
James Bridger was an
American who had an inti
mate knowledge of the
mountains and the Indians,
from New Mexico to Idaho.
He did much to publicize the
Yellowstone Park region,
and is credited with being
the first white man to see
the Great Salt Lake.
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Report Findings
Each team stressed the im
portance of continued research
for new products that are tastier,
have longer shelf lives, are less
susceptible to damage and
disease, have more appealing
textures, etc.
New product research should
also focus on innovative
packaging techniques, and new
styles and sizes of servings with
built-in consumer appeal.
Examining commodity grading
practices, the marketing teams
advised that grading systems be
improved to adequately reflect
product quality. Some teams
recommended a complete
overhauling of current grading
practices. Other prescribed the
PX6»
Choice of
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elimination of grades that are
seldom used.
Many industry spokesmen said
they favored stricter grading
systems that would keep inferior
goods from entering the market.
Improved grading standards
might bolster consumer con
fidence in the commodities,
simplify purchase decisions, and
result in bigger sales.
The marketing teams also
investigated growers’ charges
that:
- marketing margins are ex
cessive;
- processors are not giving them
a fair deal;
- USDA statistics and market
reports are incomplete and lack
(ContinuedOn Page 7)
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