AMERICA'S WHEAT RECORD
By GUNTHER STEIN New York.
ONthe sun-bathed fields of Texas the winter wheat is getting ripe for an early harvest. All over the United States the winter crop is far advanced and growing more bountifully than ever. Secured by sufficient moisture in the ground and exceptionally free from the danger of black rust, it is practically certain to yield an all-time record harvest of over one billion bushels, a total that would have seemed fantastic to American farmers before the war. Even if the somewhat delayed spring crop were to reach only one-quarter billion bushels, America could still expect to harvest altogether twelve per cent more wheat than during the record year of 1946, or almost fifty per cent. more than the average of the previous ten- year period, to say nothing of the record or near-record production
prospects for other foodstuffs. • It is intended to put roo,000,000 bushels of wheat in reserve and thus to double the " carry-over " that will remain at the end of this season. Domestic seed, food and feed requirements may take up as much as 800,000,000 bushels in the event of the average American's being able to afford to maintain his present record food consump- tion, that gives him a diet thirteen per cent. more nourishing in protein than before the war, six per cent. richer in fat and one per cent. fuller in carbohydrates. This would still leave almost 40o,000,o0o bushels of wheat—not to mention the expected surpluses of other American foodstuffs, including too,000,000 bushels of grain other than wheat—for supplies to a starving world ; probably a good deal more than the 350,000,000 bushels of wheat that will have been exported by the end of the present agricultural season, on June 3oth.
But there are few in the United States who believe that the record wheat harvest and the excellent prospects of other crops will result in a drastic fall of the very high food prices, and especially of wheat, which now stands at about $2.65 per bushel, against $1.83 a year ago and around $1.00 in 1941. As the New York Times puts it, in connection with reports about the urgent needs of Asia and Europe for American food, " it is art unpleasant fact that one country's want is another's profit " ; yet the fact seems unalterable under present free-market conditions in the United States, in which speculators are able to exploit the stringent world food-situation in persistent efforts to raise prices. American consumers are at least as displeased as foreign importers by the high food prices which fail to respond to record-crop estimates. And the American Government is greatly embarrassed by the boom effect its purchases of wheat for foreign needs have on the market—at a time when a quick and far-reaching reduction of the general price-level is justly regarded as the only means of forestalling a serious economic recession later on.
The trading groups, which have been blamed by the Government and the public for raising the price of wheat to the present unjustified level are already taking up their positions for fresh price battles in the new season. " The market is faced with explosiye possibilities," the National Association of Commodity Markets and Allied Trades declared recently with reference to the Government's " excessive " export programme and the comparatively low wheat carry-over, " and federal officials should explain why they seek to mislead the public in the belief that speculation rather than the ' Government scraping of the bin' (for export purposes) is responsible for high prices." So far, Washington is still in a position to restrain wheat prices to some extent ; for it can limit the total foreign demand on the American market by allocating wheat supplies to individual countries. But the controls over exports which enable the Govern- ment to take such measures—the last remnants of war-time price and supply controls—will expire on June 30th. Unless Congress extends those control powers, which it may not do in its present " anti-bureaucratic" mood, unrestrained foreign competition for American wheat and other foodstuffs may well raise prices even further, to the detriment of consumers in the United States and abroad and at the peril of further inflating price levels the world over.
One of America's outstanding economist-businessmen, Beardsley Ruml, the chairman of Macy's, the country's largest department store, recently advocated another means of preventing the world-wide demand for American foodstuffs from keeping the price-level of the United States at its present dangerous heights. " Should this not be a time for the Department of Agriculture to take the lead in an intensive nation-wide drive for food conservation? " he asked. And he answered in a vein reminiscent of the days a year ago, when a large part of the American public favoured retrenchment of con- sumption and continued price-controls in favour of the starving outside world, "Let the nation-wide drive be on an all-out war- time basis. We were told that food would win the war. Shouldn't we be told now that food will hasten the peace? What about meat- less days, wheatless days, school gardens and farmarettes, more potato pancakes and fewer poached eggs? This . . . would con- serve food for those who need it, would bring down food prices and would help us on our way to peace-time prosperity."
But there was no reaction to this call among those responsible for American economic policies. The aversion to anything smacking of war-time restrictions has grown too strong, and the fear of future glut and depression in the domestic markets is too widespread for reduced consumption and still larger production to gain any powerful support. The vast majority of Congress today seems to ignore the fact that the United States' inescapable connection with a world starved for foods and every other kind of commodities makes it part of an economy of scarcity rather than subject to-the danger of over-abundance. It fails to appreciate the far-reaching benefits in terms of economic and political stability the United States would derive from allowing itself to play without reservations the role of an integral part of that world-wide scarcity economy. This is why discussion of food problems in the American legislature, is not con- cerned with the possibilities of a further increase in agricultural production and surpluses but with means of preventing future dangers of over-supply.
It is encouraging, however, that the Secretary of Agriculture, Clinton P. Anderson, has had the courage to propose a long-term farm-security programme of an expansive, rather than a restrictive, character which was bound to be unpopular in Congress. It is to provide for " organised, sustained and realistic abundance " by put- ting " floors " not only under agricultural price levels, as the New Deal did, but also under the level of consumption. On the domestic side, up to $1,5oo,000,000 a year are to be used for increasing the food-buying power of the poor in times of depression. Families with inadequate incomes are to be given food coupons, to be used like cash in groceries and to be redeemed by the Government. On the international side, the programme proposes the conclusion of agreements with needy countries for the export of American farm surpluses at reduced prices.
"We shall need programmes to help maintain stability of prices at levels fair to both producers and consumers," Mr. Anderson assured those who are in fear of the consequences of maximum pro- duction. But he reminded the inveterate believers in the blessings of scarcity that anything less than his proposals would lead to economic conditions " which penalise abundance." Characteristic- ally, his suggestions were immediately denounced as "Socialist ' measures designed to continue the New Deal and to treat self-reliant Americans Iike helpless people afraid of the system of free enter- prise that made them great, and the Congress shows no intention of working out a long-term farm policy before the 1948 presidential elections.
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