WORK DONE UNDER THIS ALLOTMENT This allotment is used for the pay of supervisory and facilitating personnel necessary for the field work done from Emergency Conservation Work camps on revested Oregon and California railroad grant lands in Oregon; also for purchase of necessary equipment and construction materials and miscellaneous expenses incident to such field work. The field work is done to make possible more effective fire protection on these publicly owned timber lands. This allotment (Puerto Rico) is used for the payment of authorized enrollees and the supervisory personnel engaged in the technical direction of the work projects on the Luquillo National Forest and the insular forests, and for the purchase of equipment and supplies incident to the work. The work projects comprise the construction and maintenance of roads and trails, production of nursery stock, making new and thinning old forest plantations, forest thinnings to improve the timber stands within the national and insular forests, and development of a recreational area within the national forest. With a population of 1,500,000 the unemployment situation on the island has been acute, and, since the enrollment of the 1,200 men has been on a prorata basis from the 72 insular municipalities, the Emergency Conservation Work has played its part in giving a measure of relief. Camps are not established as they are in the States, since a large proportion of the enrollees live at home and go to and from the work projects. This allotment is used for the pay of supervisory and facilitating personnel necessary for field work done from Emergency Conservation Work camps located on Navy Department reservations, such as Bremerton, Hawthorne, and Indianhead; also for the purchase of the necessary equipment and construction materials and for miscellaneous expenses incident to the field work of the camps. The field work includes construction of firebreaks, reduction of fire hazards, fire presuppression, forest-stand improvement, truck trails, fences, and landing fields. 7. Emergency conservation work in drought-stricken agricultural areas....... $4, 201, 240 Arizona__. California This allotment for emergency conservation work in drought areas was allocated to States approximately as follows, 1935: This allotment was used to pay for the supervisory and facilitating personnel necessary for the field work done from the additional camps in the droughtstricken agricultural areas; also for the purchase of the necessary equipment and construction materials and for miscellaneous expenses incident to the field work of the camps. The field work consisted of the same general kind of work done by other camps on the national forests and on State and municipal lands in the States in which these drought-relief camps were located, and in some instances the drought-allotment personnel was enrolled in the regular nationalforest on State-land camps. (2) Indirect allotments (emergency conservation work, financed by War Department) activities of Civilian Conservation Corps: National forests.. Alaska. State, municipal, and privately owned lands.. 23, 223, 199 Oregon and California railroad grant lands. 262, 245 Puerto Rico. 692, 784 Navy Department reservations. 106, 637 22, 430, 881 19, 322 891, 832 19, 227 Drought-stricken agricultural areas... 4, 201, 240 SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 1936. BUREAU OF CHEMISTRY AND SOILS STATEMENT OF DR. W. W. SKINNER, ASSISTANT CHIEF Mr. CANNON. We will take up the estimates for the Bureau of Chemistry and Soils. Dr. Knight is in charge of that work. Dr. SKINNER. Dr. Knight is not able to be here, Mr. Chairman. Mr. CANNON. And you are appearing for the Bureau? Dr. SKINNER. I am appearing for the Bureau; yes, sir. Mr. CANNON. Dr. Skinner, do you care to make a preliminary statement? Dr. SKINNER. No, sir. I would like, Mr. Chairman, to have the privilege of inserting, after certain of these supporting statements, an additional statement; but I will not make a general statement in regard to the work of the Bureau. Mr. CANNON. We will be very glad to have you do that. SALARIES AND EXPENSES Mr. CANNON. The preliminary item is as follows: For all necessary expenses connected with the investigations, experiments, and demonstrations hereinafter authorized, independently or in cooperation with other branches of the Department of Agriculture, other departments or agencies of the Federal Government, States, State agricultural experiment stations, universities and other State agencies and institutions, counties, municipalities, business or other organizations and corporations, individuals, associations, and scientific societies, including the employment of necessary persons and means in the city of Washington and elsewhere; rent outside the District of Columbia, and other necessary supplies and expenses, and for erection, alteration, and repair of buildings outside the District of Columbia at a total cost not to exceed $5,000, as follows: GENERAL ADMINISTRATIVE EXPENSES Mr. CANNON. The item for administrative expenses is as follows: General administrative expenses: For necessary expenses for general administrative purposes, including the salary of chief of bureau and other personnel services in the District of Columbia, $90,241. Dr. SKINNER. The following statement is presented for the record: WORK DONE UNDER THIS APPROPRIATION This appropriation provides for the salaries and expenses of the office of the Chief of Bureau and the business organization units, such as accounting, personnel, editorial, supplies, etc. It is for the purpose of maintaining general administration and direction of the Bureau. Mr. CANNON. You have had no increase in personnel during the year and there is no change in your general administrative expenses? Dr. SKINNER. There is no change in our general administrative expenses. AGRICULTURAL CHEMICAL INVESTIGATIONS Mr. CANNON. The next item is: Agricultural chemical investigations: For conducting the investigations contemplated by the Act of May 15, 1862 (U. S. C., title 5, secs. 511, 512), relating to the application of chemistry to agriculture; for the biological, chemical, physical, microscopical, and technological investigation of foods, feeds, drugs, plant and animal products, and substances used in the manufacture thereof; for investigations of the physiological effects and for the pharmacological testing of such products and of insecticides; for the investigation and development of methods for the manufacture of sugars, sugar sirups, and starches, and the utilization of new agricultural materials for such purposes; for the technological investigation of the utilization of fruits and vegetables and for frozen pack investigations; for the investigation of chemicals for the control of noxious weeds and plants; and to cooperate with associations and scientific societies in the development of methods of analysis, $360,260. Dr. SKINNER. The following statement is presented in explanation of this estimate: Appropriation Act, 1936. 1 $383, 930 Fruits and Vegetable Crops and Diseases, Bureau of Plant +36, 338 Insecticide and Fungicide Investigations, Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine (pharmacological effects of insecticides). Allotments from this appropriation to +20,000 Industrial Utilization of Farm Products and Byproducts (utilization of agricultural wastes) - -76, 486 Agricultural Fires and Explosive Dusts (work on farm fires). -13, 522 350, 260 360, 260 10,000 Net total available, 1936. Increase The foregoing allotments are carried forward by means of transfers in the estimates for 1937. Perspective.-Food research as a Federal project is as old as Federal interest in scientific work. The first appropriation in this country for purely scientific service in agriculture was made at the first session of the Th.rtieth Congress, 1846-47, when $1,000 was granted "for the institution of a system of analyses of different grains produced in this country and of flour manufactured here and exported abroad." The report of work done under this appropriation, which forms an appendix to the agricultural report of the Patent Office for the year 1848, was the first report of a completed Federal project in agricultural chemistry and in food research. The act of Congress which established the Department of Agriculture was approved by President Lincoln on May 15, 1862. Section 3 of the act provides that "it shall be the duty of the Commissioner of Agriculture to acquire and preserve * ** information by practical and scientific experiments", and section 4 provides that he "shall employ other persons, for such time as their services may be needed, including chemists, botanists, entomologists, and other persons skilled in the natural sciences pertaining to agriculture." The chemist was the first professional employee appointed, and some of his earliest reports are concerned with work on American fruits and grains and their products. Before the Bureau of Animal and Dairy Industries was organized the chemist was in charge of work on meat, poultry, eggs, dairy products, and fish, as well as fruit, vegetables, and nuts, and the early food work of the Bureau of Chemistry includes a series of achievements in the fields of canning, preserving, dehydration, and the prevention of spoilage and deterioration in fresh and prepared foods. According to the Biennial Census of Manufacturers, compiled by the Bureau of the Census, the manufacture of foods and food products is by far the largest and most important "industry group" in the United States, with a value of products in 1933 totaling over 5.5 billion dollars, more than one-third of this sum being value added by manufacture. Of this vast total, manufactured foods and food products with a value of more than 3 billion dollars come within the field served by this project. Object. It is the aim of the Food Research to increase the above-mentioned added valuation, and by so doing to stimulate the market for raw materials, thus adding to the farm price of grains, fruits, vegetables, and other products processed for food purposes. The research work is directed toward increasing the efficiency of recognized methods and developing new methods in the preservation of food products by canning, dehydrating, freezing, and storing; in the prevention of spoilage by rancidity, by bacterial or enzymic decomposition and by "spontaneous" heating or ignition; and in the utilization of culls, surplus, and waste for the manufacture of food and nonfood products. Plan. These investigations are concerned with the economical utilization of fruit and vegetable culls and crop surpluses; enhancement of the value of cereal products, as in improving the food value of flours, retarding the staling of baked products, and developing new malting processes; development of valuable byproducts; preservation by various methods, such as canning, freezing, drying, or by chemical treatments; and utilization of cannery wastes. The portion of the fruit crop graded as culls often constitutes from 20 to 30 percent of the total crop and represents that much loss unless methods of profitable utilization are developed. In years of overproduction, the disposal of the surplus in the form of byproducts also acts to stabilize the fresh market. One of the present problems of outstanding importance to the fruit industry is the satisfactory preservation of various fruit juices, both fermented and unfermented. The type of fruit suitable for juice extraction is not suitable for direct sale, yet is of the highest degree of palatability and dietary utility. Of similar importance is the preservation of pulp fruit by freezing. Other studies being conducted are on the ethylene treatment for the more uniform ripening of fruits and vegetables; on sulphuring, bleaching, and shade drying; and on the effects of freezing on fruits. These investigations are carried on at field laboratories in California, Florida, New York, Texas, and Washington (State), where abundant raw materials are readily available and where the problems can be studied in relation to regional conditions. An increase of $10,000 is requested for investigations directed toward the production of cane sirup of uniform grade and other aspects of the domestic sugar industry so as to improve marketability and increase the farm price.About 60 percent of the output of the continental cane-sugar industry consists of raw sugar, It is estimated that by manufacture of direct consumption sugar (that is, any sugar which is consumed as made from the cane without further refining), instead of raw sugar, the return from sugarcane to the planter may be materially increased. The purpose of this work is to solve chemical and technological problems in order that the continental cane-sugar industry may produce all its output in the form of direct-consumption sugar and that cane growers may produce cane sirup of more marketable quality. This project concerns primarily the smaller sugarcane growers and smaller plantation sugar houses which are not equipped to produce sugar of refined granulated grade. The requirements of a considerable proportion of the retail trade and of food industries within reasonable transportation cost distance of points of production are such as to permit use of grades of direct consumption sugar which can be readily produced by these small plantation sugar houses, provided suitable methods are developed. CHANGE IN LANGUAGE The purpose of the changes in the wording of the appropriation bill for the Bureau of Chemistry and Soils is to make the language more definitive of the work of the Bureau, thereby rendering the intent and scope of the investigations more apparent to those charged with the approval of the estimates of the necessary funds. The new language relates to work which has been transferred to this Bureau and new work for which funds were appropriated last year. In the interest of a more logical and effective grouping of the work and for the coordination of like activities, there has been transferred to this Bureau, by order of the Secretary of Agriculture, supervision of the investigational work on the pharmacological effects of insecticides for which funds were provided in the appropriation of the Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine, and of the fruit and vegetable utilization and frozen-pack investigations formerly conducted by the Bureau of Plant Industry. New language covering investigations on the chemical control of noxious weeds and plants is inserted to cover work which has recently been inaugurated under funds provided in the appropriation for the current year. The wording which has been bracketed for omission from this item refers to activities which are being combined with other subappropriation items of this Bureau for the purpose of simplification of the estimates and for the more |