Agriculture's Capacity to Produce: Possibilities under Specified Conditions

Excerpt from the report Preface: State-by-State appraisals of productive capacity and estimates of production that would be attainable by 1955 in a defense period were carried out by committees appointed by the State Experiment Station directors. Membership on these committees included production specialists, agricultural economists, extension workers, and other State and Federal agricultural workers who were thoroughly familiar with agricultural conditions in that State. Each State committee analyzed production potentialities and estimated the production attainable by 1955 for each major farm commodity produced in that State. These estimates were made within a projected national framework of prices, costs, and other production and market conditions that would be consistent with a high-level defense economy. The principal objective was that of determining a level and pattern of production, area by area, and State by State, that would represent balanced, sustained farm production to meet the needs of a defense economy.