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At any rate, all the agricultural cooperatives and collective sorting centers have been integrated and expanded to carry out such unnecessary activities. This is called "modernization." The produce is packed and loaded onto the great delivery system and shipped off to the consumer.

To say it in a word, until there is a reversal of the sense of values which cares more for size and appearance than for quality, there will be no solving the problem of food pollution.

* This fruit ripens naturally late in the fall.

The Marketing of Natural Food

For the past several years I have sent 88 to 110 bushels (5,000-6,500 pounds) of rice to natural food stores in various parts of the country. I have also shipped 400 thirty-five-pound cartons of mandarin oranges in ten-ton trucks to the co-op living association in Tokyo's Suginami district. The chairman of the co-op wanted to sell unpolluted produce, and this formed the basis of our agreement.

The first year was quite successful but there were also some complaints. The size of the fruit was too varied, the exterior was a bit dirty, the skin was sometimes shriveled and so on. I had shipped the fruit in plain unmarked cartons, and there were some people who suspected, without reason, that the fruit was just an assortment of "seconds." I now pack the fruit in cartons lettered "natural mandarins."

Since natural food can be produced with the least expense and effort, I reason that it should be sold at the cheapest price. Last year, in the Tokyo area, my fruit was the lowest priced of all. According to many shopkeepers the flavor was the most delicious. It would be best, of course, if the fruit could be sold locally, eliminating the time and expense involved in shipping, but even so, the price was right, the fruit was free of chemicals and it tasted good. This year I have been asked to ship two or three times as much as before.

At this point the question arises as to how far the direct sale of natural food can spread. I have one hope in this regard. Lately chemical fruit growers have been driven into an extremely tight economic pinch, and this makes the production of natural food more attractive to them. No matter how hard the average farmer works applying chemicals, coloring, waxing, and so on, he can only sell his fruit for a price that will barely cover expenses. This year, even a farm with exceptionally fine fruit can only expect to realize a profit of less than five cents per pound. The farmer producing slightly lower quality fruit will end up with nothing at all.

Since prices have slumped in the past few years, the agricultural co-ops and sorting centers have become very strict, selecting fruit of only the very highest quality. Inferior fruit cannot be sold to the sorting centers. After putting in a full day's work in the orchard harvesting the mandarin oranges, loading them into boxes, and carrying them to the sorting shed, the farmer must work until eleven or twelve o'clock at night, picking over his fruit, one by one, keeping only those of perfect size and shape.*

The "good ones" sometimes average only 25% to 50% of the total crop, and even some of these are rejected by the co-op. If the profit remaining is a mere two or three cents per pound, it is considered pretty good. The poor citrus farmer is working hard these days and still barely breaking even.

Growing fruit without applying chemicals, using fertilizer, or cultivating the soil involves less expense, and the farmer's net profit is therefore higher. The fruit I ship out is practically unsorted; I just pack the fruit into a box, send them off to the market, and get to bed early.

The other farmers in my neighborhood realize that they are working very hard only to end up with nothing in their pockets. The feeling is growing that there is nothing strange about growing natural food products, and the producers are ready for a change to farming without chemicals. But until natural food can be distributed