tion in this connection. An agricultural program should include this diverted acreage, not a soil-bank area where the rainfall is in excess of 25 or 30 inches. There if you abandon land or do not fertilize or crop it, it becomes poorer each year. Therefore, the soil-conservation program, the water-control program, or something of that sort would be a vastly better suggestion for our northeastern farmers. Also I believe in the ingenuity of the farmers.

I happen to have been born in China. When I was in China at the age of 2 I had 17 dairy cows serving as a 2-year-old child, and those 17 dairy cows were unable to supply enough milk.

The CHAIRMAN. For you?

Mr. RENOUF. For me alone. And my father finally sold those cows and sent to Montgomery, Ward & Co. and imported Carnation milk from the United States.

I believe that our technique is sufficient to compete with low labor of any country. If we cannot raise half as much rice per acre as a Chinaman, I think the Arkansas farmer should learn something about fertilizer and machinery.

I think the farm program should be based upon an optimistic outlook. The Government's role in it should be a matter of insurance and give the farmer a chance and he will make a great success of it. The CHAIRMAN. All right. Thank you very much.

Next is Mr. Stoddard.

Mr. STANTON. He filed a statement.

(The prepared statement of Mr. Henry A. Stoddard, Vermont State Grange, Bellow Falls, Vt., is as follows:)

My name is Henry A. Stoddard, and I represent the Vermont State Grange. I am sure that I represent the majority of 17,000 plus members of the order in Vermont.

We believe in the flexible-support price for milk products and so-called basic crops as the only plan that is workable at the present time. But we look forward to the day when through self-help the Government pricing program may be done away with entirely.

We feel the school-lunch and special school-milk programs should be continued. We object to the Government bringing large tracts of land into cultivation as long as production exceeds demand.

We believe in the appropriation of sufficient Federal funds to continue the work of the Soil Conservation Service to permit the continuance of this important work of protecting our vital soil and water resources.

The CHAIRMAN. Next we will hear from Mr. Ernest W. Dunklee.

STATEMENT OF ERNEST W. DUNKLEE, WINDHAM COUNTY FARM BUREAU, VERNON, VT.

Mr. DUNKLEE. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I will not read all of the prepared statement but would like to select 2 or 3 statements to read.

The CHAIRMAN. The whole statement will be put in the record.

Mr. DUNKLEE. 1. General prices received by farmers in my area are not enough to take care of our increased costs and leave a reasonable income for labor involved.

2. Much has been said and will be said about milk prices. We want to go on record as favoring the continuation of the Federal milkmarketing orders in our area, with constant study, and changes as necessary, to keep them equitable with changing conditions.

3. We believe flexible price supports will in the long run prove more beneficial to farmers and the country as a whole than would rigid price supports.

The CHAIRMAN. Can that be done administratively without a change in the law?

Senator AIKEN. Yes. You do not have to do that to amend the milk order.

Mr. DUNKLEE. That is right. I have one statement touching on that.

4. We favor the continuation and expansion of research in agriculture, and especially in the field of marketing farm products.

Speaking for myself, I believe that such changes in legislation should be made as are necessary to permit producers under a Federal order to assess themselves for advertising purposes.

Production of surplus milk, and this is my opinion, in this area is not caused by low prices or Federal orders, but rather because the dairy farmer as an individual has no control over the proportion of his milk selling for class 2.

Many farmers would be willing and glad to decrease their production if their remaining product was sold at a fluid milk price.

Further, I believe our country is more secure with a program_resulting in small surpluses and Government purchases than with a program of shortages and resulting ration.

(The prepared statement of Mr. Ernest W. Dunklee is as follows:) I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this Senate committee. My name is Ernest W. Dunklee. I am a farmer from Windham County Vt., I have a dairy herd of a little over 200 head of which about 125 are milk cows. I am treasurer of the town of Vernon and have served as a director or trustee of Windham County Farm Bureau for 33 years.

I am not a student of parity or of all the ills of agriculture today, but a few of my neighbors and I got together and would like to make the following statements:

1. General prices received by farmers in my area are not enough to take care of our increased costs and leave a reasonable income for labor involved.

2. Much has been said, and will be said about milk prices. We want to go on record as favoring the continuation of the Federal milk marketing orders in our area, with constant study, and changes as necessary, to keep them equitable with changing conditions.

3. We believe flexible price supports will in the long run prove more beneficial to farmers and the country as a whole than would rigid price supports. 4. We favor the continuation and expansion of research in agriculture, and especially in the field of marketing farm products.

5. We wish to go on record as favoring the work of the Department in connection with extension education, the agricultural conservation program, the Soil Conservation Service, and Forestry Service. We believe strongly that the ACP program of cost sharing has meant that a lot more conservation work has been done in Vermont than would otherwise have been done. If there is any way to make this program less restrictive and less complicated, that should be done. 6. We believe in the work of the animal disease eradication branch and recommend renewed support in the eradication of brucellosis. Thanks again for the opportunity to appear before this important and honorable committee.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, sir.

We will next hear from Mr. Roy Wood.

STATEMENT OF ROY W. WOOD, PITTSFORD, VT.

Mr. WOOD. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I have been on the farm. since 1928. I am just speaking at the present time as an individual

farmer. I did not hear well this forenoon, but I do not think anybody touched the flood-control problem.

Of course, that is pretty close to us right here in New England. The CHAIRMAN. That is a subject that this committee has no jurisdiction over.

Mr. WOOD. We will drop that, then.

The CHAIRMAN. Except the small watershed, if that is what you had in mind.

Mr. WOOD. I think perhaps that is a method of controlling some of these floods. We had a Government survey in the Otter Creek Valley back a few years ago. The result was that it would do no good to dredge the creek unless we went back and stopped the freshet floods that brought the sediment down and filled the creek up.

The CHAIRMAN. Incidentally, while you are talking about flood control and this water conservation, et cetera, I am presently the chairman of a subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee that handles all of the moneys for flood control and related projects. I found it strange that the people of the New England States somehow have not been over-enthusiastic for the programs that were authorized by the Corps of Engineers in order to protect you from floods here. I wondered if that attitude has changed.

Mr. Wood. At the time that this survey was made there was an estimated cost to the landowners somewhere in the neighborhood of $100 an acre, which was like buying their land over again and even more. For that reason the landowners were not interested.

The program at that time was dropped a good many years ago. At the present time, I wonder, as the war tension ceases, if the Army engineers could be put into this flood area to work out a program to hold back the floodwaters and stop some of the disaster and a continuation of it. There is a vast amount of money spent to rehabilitate and bring back the flooded areas and they are immediately flooded again.

On the forestry program that I have here, I think that possibly that could be a State problem or a joint Federal and State problem. I think probably that is the secret of some of our flood problems. The way we have taken the forests off our hillsides and left those hillsides unprotected for the floodwaters to come down into the valleys, causes me to wonder if we could not have an intensified program, a forestry program that would put forest trees back onto these hillsides.

Then we have another problem here in Vermont. As these hill farms are being bought up by city people who come in for a summer home, they generally abandon the land, and that land grows up into bush. I wonder if a forestry program would not be appropriate on that abandoned land.

Senator AIKEN. I have a bill in on that which would authorize Federal participation on the same basis that they are authorized to participate on soil water conservation. It has not come back to the committee with a report yet.

Mr. Wood. These forests in the future could be a great natural resource to New England.

In regard to what I have to say on these three other items, I represent the Dairymen's League. I was subdistrict president and represented about 955 producers that market their milk largely in New York. A few of us are marketing in Boston.

I have this on the New York Federal order. The Federal orders have been of great benefit to the dairymen here in the Northeast and they have resulted in stable markets in providing each dairyman with his share of the fluid market, but as time goes on conditions arise that require order changes to meet the situation. Such is the case now. The so-called deficiency markets, or areas that have to go out into Federal Order No. 27 territory for supplies and take only what they need when they need it, and leave the Federal order producers to carry th surpluses in times of heavy supply, create a problem. These supplies in surplus work on the supply demand factor of the formula to lower the class 1 price. They also lower the percentage sold in class 1, thereby affecting the blend in two ways. The biggest offender is northern New Jersey, which is one big city with New York, only the river dividing them. We should have a comprehensive order for New York and northern New Jersey.

Then I had the same complaint as the previous gentleman here that amendments previously to the New York order have been submitted for referendum vote to the producers, with the ultimatum that they vote "Yes" or the lost the order. I would think that that was unfair because the cooperatives in several cases had to vote under protest for something they thought would not correct the situation that exists. In regard to research

The CHAIRMAN. That has been covered.

Mr. Wood. That has been covered, but the new suggestion was I wondered if some of these top scientists who have been working on these atomic weapons to destroy our enemies, as this war situation eases a little bit, if some of that could not be put to work on some research on milk and new uses for it and new ways to market it.

On some of our animal diseases, to do some research in regard to that. Then on foreign markets, I have this to offer: I understand England and Russia are ahead of us in the development of atomic power for peaceful purposes. There will be a race to get into undeveloped countries with atomic power. The country that gets there first has won prestige in that country and can open up that country for all the goods they make, including dairy products. It will be a sad day if Russia takes over too many countries economically.

I hope that we will be able to beat Russia to a good many of those countries and help develop them economically and thereby open up markets for our goods.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you, sir. Your full statement will be made a part of the record.

(The prepared statement of Roy W. Wood is as follows:)

My name is Roy W. Wood. I have operated, since 1928, the farm I live on in Pittsford, Vermont. I milk 50 cows and they are the only farm income.

I was asked by a few individuals just last week to testify for the farmers of Rutland County. The time was short so I sent a letter to Washington asking for the privilege to speak for Rutland County farmers. I since looked around and found that there was no movement by the cooperatives or the farm organizations of the county for me to speak for them. So today, I speak as an individual farmer and I like it that way better, as I can say what I think. I served the farmers of Rutland County as their Farm Bureau president and I work with farmers in other capacities, so I think I know how farmers feel.

As I said, I started farming just the right time to get caught in the depression after World War I. We have had another depression and a recession since, and now a price squeeze. In 1928 the farm I bought had 40 cows that were producing about 500 pounds of milk. I immediately laid plans to increase the number of

cows and bring up production. As the depression bore down on us, I stepped production up to 1,000 pounds per day; 1,200, 1,500, 1,750 until the best winter I was producing 2,000 pounds average for 3 months. This was the principal reason I was able to ride out the depression.

This price squeeze is not going to scare out the older men like myself, who have lived through it. Right now I have more heifer calves in the calf pens than I have had this time of year for 5 years back, and I am laying plans to increase the dairy to 60 cows.

The man with from 5 to 10 cows who works in a factory probably likes to live out of town and he never had so much money to throw in the little farm to keep it going, and in the next year or two he will only be working in the factory 35 hours a week. He will have still more time to work on the farm. So he will not be put out of business.

The rich man with that nice big farm will not mind falling prices. He never hoped to operate in the black and now he never made so much money in his other business. A price squeeze will not scare him. A few inefficient farmers will give up and find something else.

The thing that will hurt the most is that the young farmer who has had the urge and the courage to start farming will be caught and in all too many cases forced out. They are the group that we need to encourage the most. They will be feeding the Nation 10 to 25 years from now when we older men will be through. We fail to look far enough ahead.

ASC programs. The farmers of Rutland County have appreciated the PMA, the ASC and the soil conservation programs. We still need their services to help us preserve the topsoil and put back the fertility into the soil that our predecessors took out. A good program is needed in Rutland County more than some other counties because our acreage allows us to raise but very little of our dairy grains. Therefore, a pasture improvement and legume roughage program is very necessary. We need a lot of lime and phosphate in the county. I think the price squeeze is the reason that there is not better participation in the programs. There just is not money enough to go around.

Soil conservation: There is plenty to be done in soil conservation. Rutland County needs it as bad as any county and more than some.

Flood control and drainage go hand in hand. Much drainage has been done in Otter Creek Valley and much more needs to be done. At the request of the landowners of the valley, Government engineers came in and made a preliminary survey of Otter Creek Valley. At that time the engineers said that it would do no good to dredge out the creek until we went back into the hills and put in dams to hold back the floodwaters at freshet time. The program would have been so expensive to the landowners that it would have been like buying the land over again. There are literally hundreds of acres of rich bottom land that you cannot get onto or is growing up to brush that hay was cut on 30 years ago.

Someone says that we have too much land in production anyway. Don't you believe it. With the population of this country growing as it is, we will need every acre we have to feed them. A country never should waste its natural re

sources.

Flood control is close to our hearts in New England. Vermont escaped this year, but we have had a taste of it before and our turn will surely come again. We hear a great deal about disaster insurance but not much about control and prevention. As the war tension eases, it would seem as if Army engineers could be sent into flood areas to work out a way to hold floodwaters back and save the destruction of life and property.

Soil erosion: As I have ridden in a plane over Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and Atlantic Seaboard States and viewed the farmland, it would appear to me we were behind in New England in strip cropping and contour farming as a means to stop soil erosion.

Forestry, is the key to many of our flood troubles. Lack of an adequate forestry program or the utter disregard for good forestry practices by past and even the present generation is to blame for the flood disasters and drainage problems we have. We need a stepped-up forestry program to again bring back one of our great natural resources and protect us from flood disaster. In Rutland County, as in many counties, we have hill farms being sold to city people who wish to spend the summers in the country. The farmland in most cases is abandoned. A program of setting this land out to forest trees should be put into operation.