Word: drought
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...women's groups for example), groups that appear and disappear fairly frequently (the New Right Coalition and other libertarian groups, for example) and ad hoc pressure groups that spring up around particular issues. Last year there were groups interested in raising money for the victims of the North African drought, picketing military recruiters, changing the academic calendar, and raising money for Israel during the October...
...food-price inflation. Last week what little hope remained that it would be eased by bumper crops this year vanished. On the fourth day of the Ford Administration, the Department of Agriculture released new crop forecasts that seemed to confirm the worst fears about the effects of the blistering drought that has gripped the Midwestern Farm Belt this summer after heavy spring rains spoiled the planting season (TIME...
...possible that these estimates are a bit too pessimistic. The rains have finally come to most of the Midwest, leading one weather forecaster in Des Moines, Iowa, to announce that the drought was over. If so, farmers might yet squeeze higher yields out of corn already planted. But most farm experts remain discouraged. "So much damage has already been done," says Billy Ray Gowdy, commissioner of agriculture in Oklahoma, where farmers are worried that there will not be enough rain for a good sorghum harvest and that the soil will be far too dry to plant a new crop...
Oddly, consumers could get some initial benefit from the drought. As the prices of corn and soybean feeds rise, farmers are bringing cattle, hogs and other livestock to market early, causing a temporary glut that could help to keep meat prices down-at first. By next winter or spring, though, that oversupply will be exhausted and meat prices probably will rise with a vengeance. There are some signs, too, of a revival of the panicky export buying that in the past has done much to push up U.S. food prices. Foreign buying so far has been no more than moderate...
...will be in the White House could not ignite a lasting rally, what could? The answer: nothing immediately foreseeable. The market's drop reflects an unsentimental appreciation of the fact that the change in Administrations cannot quickly halt inflation. Referring to this summer's recently ended Midwest drought, which is sending up food prices, one broker quips: "What is he [President Ford] expected to do? Chew out the Lord for not providing rain?" Meanwhile, high interest rates continue to draw money out of stocks into such investments as Treasury notes and utility bonds, and trading is too light...