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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 21, 1974)
Green Revolution' has already come Greater agricultural output costly, difficult in America By DAN MORGAN [C] 1974, The Washington Post WASHINGTON - The suggestion that United States •technology can achieve a rapid expansion of food production has been challenged following President Ford's call to farmers to increase their output as part of the fight against inf.ation. A report released Friday by a subcommittee of the House Agriculture Committee, called "Malthus and America," contained a number of gloomy conclusions about the country's technical and financial limits on growing more food. The report also stated that land, water, energy, and fertilizer are all in short supply, and added that in the world as a whole, "pressures of growing demand for food are beginning to undermine the ecology of major food producing systems. The President's challenge to farmers to grow more came at a time when many economists believe that the Great Leap Forward in U.S. farm productivity already has occurred, for a variety of reasons. In their view, it is questionable whether new technology, new seed strains, more fertilizer, pesticides and irrigation projects could repeat the kind of dramatic gains of the last 30 years in the United States - a period when yields of such basic crops as corn quadrupled. There is also concern that the weather has been un derestimated by U.S. policymakers as a factor with profound impact on output. Some meteorologists say that the Administration has assumed that technology has made the U.S. agricultural system virtually drought-resistant. They say there is evidence that the drought which damaged the corn crop in the Great Plains this summer may be a part of a cyclical period of bad weather. Not all estimates are as entirely gloomy. Don Paarlberg, Director of Economics for the Agriculture Department, said in testimony before the subcommittee that the United States has the capacity to produce 9.1 billion bushels of corn and 2.3 billion bushels of wheat by 1965, compared with an estimated crop of 4.7 billion and 1.7 billion bushels respectively this year. But even optimists agree that greater output and improved productivity will be far more expensive and tedious to achieve than in the past. Most farmland that was held out of production by the Government during the surplus years of the 1960s is being cultivated again. Since 1972, when U.S. grain reserves dwindled because of enormous foreign pur chases, some 40 million idle acres have been put back into crops. There are no longer any restrictions on growing wheat, corn, soybeans and other essential crops, yet production of all three fell below expectations this year. (Continued on Page 13) Famine spreading in West Bengal By WALTER SCHWARZ [C] 1974, The London Observer COOCH BEHAR, India — Starvation is spreading with the geometrical progression of a plague in this district ana three others in the state of West Bengal. There is rice to be bought in the markets, within sight of people dying of hunger. They cannot af ford to buy even the meager ration, at subsidized prices, of one pound of rice or wheat weekly a head. In the former princely state of Cooch Behar. now a district with 1,500,000 people at the most con servative estimate, more than 1,000 have starved to death in the last two months. A representative of the ruling Congress Party put it at 3,000. People have become so weak that hundreds more are now dying every day in the four districts of Cooch Behar, Bangkura, Purulia and Jalpaiguri. The government of India has been trying to play down the extent of the famine both at home and abroad, but even a casual visitor can see it for himself. .. Everywhere there are people, especially small children and old people, so emaciated that they could scarcely survive, even rf substantial relief were expected in the coming weeks. But no relief is in sight, and next month, when cold weather is added to hunger, the death toll in this state will inevitably run into several thousands. The immediate cause of the famine — the worst since the Great Bengal Famine of 1943 — is not outright lack of food, but that the poor have no money to buy it. The West Bengal government has no funds for more than token relief, while the central government in New Delhi has not yet accorded the situation any special priority. Torrential rains and floods in the monsoon destroyed both the rice and the jute crop in some districts here, leaving the bulk of the rural population, who are landless laborers or have only tiny plots, without any income, so food brought in from elsewhere is beyond any income, and so food brought in from elsewhere is beyond their reach. As I drove into Punibari village, my car nearly ran over a corpse on the highway. The man's naked body, with an empty begging bowl by its side, might have come out of Belsen. Nobody knew who he was, and villagers passed by hardly noticing. He had died the previous night. (Continued on Page 12) \ In This Issue... m the month of October Moslems everywhere celecmte Ramadan with daylong fasts and night time feasts. Columnist Jim Hoag/and reports on festivities in Cairo. Ireland's Foreign Minister traces the history of Northern Ireland's crisis from the arrival of stand-offish Protestants on Irish shores 300 years ago. While Southern Cal did what was expected and won Saturday's football game 16-7, an inspired Oregon defense made them sweat for it. Paul Geis led Oregon's Cross Country team to victory Saturday in its first race of the year. Oregon’s Terry Williams finished second and Gary Barker third.
