our exports of these commodities in 1808 was due primarily to burdensome restrictions imposed by the war-time commercial policies of Great Britain and France on exports carried in neutral ships and the retaliatory embargoes laid by Congress in 1807 on all American trade with these two nations.

Our export business in provisions and livestock was recovering to some extent when the second war with England broke out in 1812. This event marked the beginning of a period of depression in our foreign trade in animal products, which reached its lowest level in the exports of 1815. Five years later exports of these commodities had attained a volume which did not change materially until 1846. It should be stated, however, that during the three decades following the close of hostilities with Great Britain, although it appeared that our foreign trade in meat animals and provisions was not materially advanced, the foundations were laid for the expansion which got well under way about 1846, our export business in animal products having by that time completely recovered from the effects of the panic of 1837.

From 1846 to the Civil War our foreign trade in livestock and meat products rose to hitherto unknown levels. The further settlement of the Mississippi Valley and the increasing surplus of livestock and meat foods, the extension of our railroad transportation system, national prosperity, and greatly improved monetary conditions following the discovery of gold in California, and the growing demand for imported foodstuffs in English and Continental markets, combined at this period to stimulate the growth of our export business in meat animals and provisions.

The further increase of our export trade in these commodities during the Civil War was remarkable. The packing of pork products, particularly for export, was increased greatly during 1862 and 1863, and an extensive meat trade with England developed, crop failures in Europe at this period having caused an unusual demand for all American foodstuffs. Cheap food had become the constant problem of the densely populated countries of Europe, and the cheapness of pork products as compared with other meats and the ease and economy with which they could be cured and shipped brought them steadily into increased demand and greater relative importance among our meat exports. The surplus of meat products available for the export trade during the Civil War was greater than would have been the case if the normal outlet in the South for a great part of the packing-house products of the northern States had not been temporarily closed.

From the close of the Civil War until the end of the nineteenth century was a notable period in the growth and development of American exports of meat animals and meat products. This growth in exports was brought about by increased livestock production in the new West, with its cheap land and its flood of immigration, increased demand in Europe for foodstuffs for the constantly growing populations of the industrial centers, and the development of better and cheaper transportation facilities from the centers of production clear through to the principal foreign markets. Taken as a whole, this period of 35 years was one of growth in our export meat trade, but the cumulative effect of the economic factors mentioned above was especially apparent in the phenomenal increase

in our exports of animal products during the last two decades of the nineteenth century.

By 1900 our annual foreign sales of meat products had attained a volume which surpassed that of any previous period, and was not exceeded until the European War. Western European nations during this period were devoting themselves assiduously to their industrial development without giving a corresponding amount of thought and energy to their agricultural production. The inevitable result of this policy was an increasing population in the industrial centers which had to purchase foodstuffs from outside sources. This increased demand alone, however, does not account altogether for the fact that United States exporters not only obtained this business but built it up steadily during this period against other competitors for the world trade in meat-food products. Our later experience in selling animal products in these same European markets shows that the low costs of our products laid down in markets abroad was the deciding factor in bringing this business to us.

CHANGES BROUGHT ABOUT BY REFRIGERATION IN TRANSPORTATION

It was during the latter part of the nineteenth century that artificial refrigeration was first successfully applied to the transportation of fresh meats both by land and by sea. Under the prevailing methods of packing meat products for export prior to the development of artificial refrigeration, the bulk of our meat export trade had been pork products. The ease and economy with which pork products could be preserved for a long period in a very palatable condition and handled in foreign shipments, together with the cheapness of American pork products in comparison with other meats, explains their predominance among the animal products entering into our foreign trade. Prior to 1875 our exports of meats had consisted almost entirely of salted meats, tallow, lard, and cured products packed principally in the winter months. In response to the English demand for fresh beef, live cattle shipments had been revived after the Civil War, but the possibilities of this method had proven to be limited. Artificial refrigeration was the solution of this problem of supplying the foreign demand for fresh meats and its development soon resulted in making chilled beef an important item in our export meat trade.

Despite early prejudices against refrigerated beef in foreign countries, our fresh-beef shipments abroad increased by leaps and bounds, and in 1900 amounted to 329 million pounds, nearly all of which was sold in the United Kingdom. Exports of other beef products, however, did not increase materially, and in our total foreign sales of packing-house products throughout this 35-year period pork products were of far greater volume than beef products. The prewar peak in our exports of hog products was reached in 1899, when we shipped out of this country 1,678 million pounds, in which amount were included about 710 million pounds of lard and approximately 600 million pounds of bacon.

DECLINE IN AMERICAN EXPORT MEAT TRADE

The twentieth century ushered in a period in American export trade in meat products which was in many respects quite different

from the 35 years of expansion which has just been reviewed. From 1900 to the beginning of the European War the United States declined in relative importance among the meat exporting countries, and at the outbreak of the war our first place in total meat exports was being closely contested by Argentina, with its increasingly large shipments of beef. It must be understood, however, that the foregoing statement applies particularly to exports and not to the production of meat products, for the United States continued to be preeminent in both the production and consumption of meat, and even as late as 1913 exported as much as 47 million pounds more meat products than Argentina, our nearest rival.

In

Certain conditions affecting our export meat trade during this period are of special significance. First among these is the greatly increased domestic demand, which in the case of beef products compelled not only the practical cessation of our exports of fresh, chilled, and frozen beef, but actually made necessary by 1914 net imports to the amount of approximately 170 million pounds. contrast to the change of the United States from a surplus to a deficiency country with respect to fresh beef, our production of other meat foods, except mutton, kept ahead of the domestic demand and left us each year an enormous surplus for export, which as late as 1913 exceeded our total imports of meat food products that year by more than a billion pounds.

In maintaining our meat export trade to this volume in the face of an increased domestic demand, hog products became relatively more important throughout this pre-war period. At the outbreak of the European War our exports of pork and its products had attained a volume six times as large as the total exports of beef and its products. This increasing proportion of pork and its derivatives in our foreign trade in meat food products is explained by the fact that in the adjustment of livestock production in the United States during this period to the growth of our population and our industrial development, hog production costs were not increased nearly so much as was the case with cattle.

The loss of our beef export business in European markets was not due primarily to a diminished demand for such products in these markets, but rather to the fact that competing beef-surplus countries, such as Argentina and Australia, could supply a cheaper product than could be obtained from the United States. In the exporting of pork products we were more fortunately situated. The changes in the methods of hog production forced upon us by our rapid industrial growth did not to any appreciable extent decrease the exportable supply or materially increase the cost of our pork products. Furthermore, there was at this time no surplus production of pork products of any consequence in any other countries except Denmark, Canada, and Russia, and these countries produced the meat type of hog rather than the lard type, which is the basis of a great part of the pork export business of the United States.

Such decline in our foreign shipments of pork products as did take place from 1900 to 1914 was due, for the most part, to a decreased need in European countries for American hog products. The Continental countries, particularly Germany and France, in accordance with their policies of self-sufficiency in foodstuffs, increased

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their domestic swine production much more than was at first considered possible. In this manner these countries produced an appreciable part of their requirements in bacon, hams, sausage, and like products. They were not, however, able to produce any considerable domestic supply of animal fats and American lard continued to be sold to the European trade in comparatively well-maintained quantities in view of the general decline in our export meat trade during this period.

The foreign market outlet for our other hog products, however, was seriously affected by the inroads made by Denmark upon our British bacon trade. Whereas our lard exports were sold to the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, and Belgium, with smaller quantities to nearly all western European countries, our exports of bacon, hams, and shoulders were bought largely by the United Kingdom, our sales of these kinds of pork products to other European countries being of distinctly minor importance. England imported hams and shoulders in decreasing quantities from 1900 to 1914, and although our sales of these to the United Kingdom declined, we apparently continued to get our share of this part of the British purchases of these two items.

With bacon, however, we had a different experience. In 1900 the United Kingdom purchased from the United States 70 per cent of all its imported bacon, and in the following year we shipped to the British markets over 400,000,000 pounds of bacon, the pre-war peak of our bacon sales to the United Kingdom. In 1913 only 37 per cent of the total bacon imported by the United Kingdom was bought from the United States, 48 per cent being imported from Denmark and 5 per cent from Canada. The English trade had turned from the United States to Denmark as the principal source of bacon partly because the Danish product was from the lean type of hog, whereas American bacon came from the lard type. The Britisher wanted his bacon leaner and also more mildly cured. Denmark from its geographical location was able to cater to his taste as to cure and the United States lost a considerable part of its total pork export business with its most important customer.

EFFECTS OF EUROPEAN WAR

The achievements of the livestock and meat industry of the United States during the European war period in supplying meat food products in record quantities to the allied nations are still fresh in the minds of all. The exigencies of that struggle developed a tremendous and insistent need for all kinds of meat products, and because of the difficulties of convoying ocean freight and the dangers of shipping from more distant meat-producing countries, the task of supplying this need devolved largely upon the American farmers and packers.

Our exports of beef products in the short period of four years were pushed from a few million pounds at the beginning of the war to the enormous amount of 792,000,000 pounds in the last war year. In this was included the increase of our fresh-beef exports alone from a little over 6,000,000 pounds in 1914 to more than 514,000,000 pounds in the 12 months of 1918. Our overseas shipments of pork products experienced the same enormous increase. The last year of the war period we exported more than 2,250,000,000 pounds and fol