Kuhfuss Scores Farm, Despite a drop in the retail price of meats in recent weeks, there still is an ab normal spread between retail and farm prices, William J. Kuhfuss, president of the American Farm Bureau Federation, said last week before a youth 3% > Designed By: BROILER BREEDER HATCHING EGG UNIT Feotur'^ Big Dutchman Equipment Reynolds Al - Roofing and Siding Styrofoam Insulation May 2, 1974 leadership conference in Oakbrook, Illinois. With hogs selling the previous week at $3O to $32 per hundredweight and choice slaughter steers at $39 to $42 per hundredweight, farmers are losing from $6 to $8 per head on hogs and up to OPEN HOUSE $lOO per head on cattle, the national farm leader said. While retail meat prices dropped some, Kuhfuss said, they do not reflect the drop from the February high of $4B for steers and $42.30 for hogs to the present levels. Such losses are causing farmers to take a careful look at increasing hog production and in buying replacement cattle for their feedlots, he said, and this Weather Delays Poor Soviet Crop Planting The Soviet government announced Wednesday that bad weather has seriously retarded the sowing of spring crops. The phrasing and statistics in the report indicated the nation may face another agriculture crisis this year. The front-page report in the central government newspaper Izvestia revealed that only 70.9 million acres of spring crops - including grains, sugar, cotton, sun flowers and vegetables - had been sown by April 22. This compared with 107.2 million acres by the same time last year, when the country’s fanners produced a record grain crop of 222.5 million tons. In 1972, bad weather and mismanagement on the farms resulted in major grain shortfalls and forced the Kremlin to spend some $2 billion of its precious hard For Longenecker's Hat h Elizabet Pern Retail Meat Price could mean higher consumer prices resulting from shorter supplies in the future. The Federation president said that farmers must have either higher market prices for cattle or hogs or a reevaluation of the other costs that must be paid for by the consumer so an adequate return can en courage an increase in production at a level to compensate the farmer and currency to import Western grain. The spring wheat crop accounts for 60 to 70 per cent of annual grain production. Izvestia said the poor weather had affected all major agricultural regions of the nation, from east ern Siberia to the European part. In the critical regions of the Russian Federation, it said, only 21.7 million acres of spring crops were sown compared with more than 54.3 million acres last year. Less than half the spring crops were sown in the northern Caucasus zones and only a quarter of those in the rich black soil regions, the heart of the nation’s grain producing. Try A Classified Ad If Pays! HERBERT BRUBAKER FARM Myerstown, Pa. R.D.3 Phone Lancaster Farming, Saturday, April 27.1974 rancher for his risk capital and labor. “Grain farmers are also faced with an increase of some 100 percent for fuel and from 200 to 300 percent in crease in fertilizer costs. “Like everyone else, farmers have been hit by increasing inflation which the government reports ran at an annual rate of 10.8 percent for the first three months of 1974, with in dications for further in creases in the second quarter. “There can be little doubt , that government-fed in flation is one of the major causes of high food prices for everything, including food. “Government price controls created chaos in the livestock industry and led to the wild price gyrations that hurt farmers as well as consumers,” Kuhfuss said. “With the removal of price controls April 30, there is some hope that the livestock industry can return to more normal operations with supply and demand per forming their normal o>oWl ngCORN NEEDS NITROGEN We Con Supply Your Needs call ZOOK & RANCK, Inc. RDI, Gap, Pa. 17527 Phone 717-442-4171 Take 501 North thru Myerstown, to Rt. 422 left on 422. Go Vz mile and turn right on 645. Go 3 /i mile and continue straight ahead where 645 turns right - farm is then Vz mile on the right. RT. 422 Gap market functions. However, until Congress and the Ad ministration takes steps to cool inflation, consumers should not be surprised by higher food prices in the last half of 1974,” Kuhfuss said. Horst Attends Seminar Marvin J. Horst of Marvin J, Horst, Lebanon, Penn sylvania, recently took part in a merchandising seminar conducted by Amana Refrigeration, Inc. at the firm’s lowa headquarters. He joined a select national group of retailers and retail salesmen as a guest of Amana for sales and marketing training on the complete line of Amana refrigerator-freezers, freezers, Radarangeiß) microwave ovens, room air conditioners, compactors and dehumidifiers. DIRECTIONS TO HERB BRUBAKER FARM ««S^ 19 READING