Читать книгу The Manufacture of Tomato Products - W. G. Hier - Страница 6

Obtaining a good quality of tomatoes at a price which is not prohibitive is a problem which in many localities is becoming more difficult to canners and catsup makers each year. Every experienced manufacturer knows that regardless of the expertness with which he may work up his tomatoes into the finished product, he cannot expect to get good quality unless he has good stock to begin with. It is true that by using intelligence and extreme care in the manufacturing processes one manufacturer will make better pulp or catsup from tomatoes of fair quality than another man can get from the best quality of stock. This same care and intelligence applied, however, in working up high quality tomatoes will probably show a greater difference in the finished products than was apparent in the tomatoes from which these products were made; in other words, the goodness of good tomatoes becomes accentuated by the manufacturing process.

In order to insure as large a proportion as possible of good quality stock, as well as a good yield per acre in tonnage, manufacturers are each year realizing the necessity of closer co-operation with the farmer. Where in growing tomatoes under contract it was formerly largely up to the farmer to buy his seed and raise his plants and set them out, it is now the usual custom to supply the farmer with seed of the desired variety and of high germination test, and in many cases to go a step farther and supply him with plants six to eight inches high, ready for setting out in the field. Unquestionably, the best results are secured by growing the plants for the farmer. The average farmer does not go about the raising of his plants in an intelligent way, and he will not devote the time to the plant-raising business that it should have.