Foreword

Ezra Taft Benson Secretary of Agriculture

To me the most startling aspect of plant diseases is that they cost us an estimated three billion dollars a year.

The tragic aspect is that much of the loss is a waste that can be prevented. Waste is contrary to the laws of Nature and the conscience of man. Waste is unworthy of a great people.

To conquer some of the diseases will not be easy. New diseases and new races of old disease-producing organisms appear all the time; race 15B of wheat stem rust and race 101 for of crown rust of oats, for instance, appeared just when we thought we had rust under control. When we extend the production of a crop, the number and prevalence of diseases seem also to grow—as has happened to soybeans.

Some diseases still outside our borders remain a threat as communications expand. Some (like tristeza disease of citrus crops) are new to our country or new to a region. Our buying and selling of more goods fruits, vegetables, nursery stock, seeds—enlarges the risk of spreading diseases even though the facilities for transportation and marketing them have been greatly improved.

The cost of materials and equipment for fighting the diseases has become enormous. And, finally, our efforts against plant diseases are made harder by the lack of information about them among many persons who have to do With plants and plant products.

Nevertheless, I am greatly encouraged by a number of developments. Plant breeders have perfected varieties of wheat, oats, strawberries,and other crops that can withstand, for a while at least, the ravages of a disease. More effective chemicals have been discovered for use against the fungi, viruses, bacteria, and nematodes, and others are in process of development. Our people give an ever-increasing measure of cooperation to regulatory procedures designed to halt the importation and spread of diseases. The handling of perishable foods has made great strides in markets, stores, and homes in a few years.

Much remains to be done, however.

The program I suggest looks toward an intensification of those efforts and greater efficiency in them.

One requirement is steady, continuous research in plant industry, geared to immediate problems and to the building up of basic knowledge that will be of use in solving problems of the future.

We need to give more attention to solving permanently the problems of plant diseases and not to be satisfied with palliatives that at best provide only temporary relief. Here, as elsewhere in agriculture, we should be mindful of the biological balance; the balance of Nature,which our modern practices of plowing, domestication of plants, fast travel, intensive cultivation, and clearing, of land keep in constant jeopardy. Our attempts to improve the health of crops have to recognize man's relationship with Nature.

Another requirement is that the information be made available to all farmers and everyone else to whom it will be useful. Historically, the function of the Department of Agriculture is to gather information—do research—of value to farmers and to disseminate that information as widely as possible. The lag in time between the acquisition of knowledge and the time it is made use of often is greater than it should be. We need to give more attention to ways to shorten that interval.

A third facet is the closer integration of these new developments into our agriculture and into the segments of our national life that are most closely tied to agriculture.

They are part of our goal for American agriculture: Ample food for all, efficient farm production and marketing, prosperity for farmers, economy in administering sound agricultural programs, continuing cooperation among all segments of society.

This Yearbook, devoted to an important subject with so many ramifications, will help greatly in the achievement of the goal.