Word: metrics
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...hosts surely needed the cheering up. America's 2.4 million farmers are struggling to survive the worst slump since the Depression, caught in a vise of rising costs and falling prices. Though they are expected to chalk up near record crops of wheat (73.8 million metric tons) and corn (208 million metric tons) this year, the silo-busting harvests will only push low prices even lower. Since 1975, as farm expenses have nearly doubled (from $75.9 billion to $141.5 billion), net farm income has fallen. Profits, which declined from $32.7 billion in 1979 to $22.9 billion last year...
Backers of the river reversals are convinced that the great investment-at least $40 billion in the early stages alone-would pay off handsomely. They predict grain production would be boosted by as much as 30 million to 60 million metric tons a year-equivalent to 18% to 35% of the U.S.S.R.'s current crop. They also point out that the northern waters would revitalize two major inland seas, the Caspian and the Aral, whose levels have been dropping rapidly because of irrigation needs...
...promising aid to the Caribbean economies, the Reagan Administration has dealt a blow to one of the region's key exports: sugar. Two weeks ago, the White House announced that it was imposing quotas on sugar imports. The countries of the Caribbean last year shipped 1.25 million metric tons of sugar...
...farm income. But so far this year exports of corn, for example, are down about onefourth. The Soviet Union, stung by the 1980 U.S. grain embargo (which one economic consulting firm estimates cost American agribusiness $22 billion), has spread out its purchases among more suppliers. Of the 43 million metric tons of grain it is expected to import from the West this year, the Soviet Union has so far bought only 13.8 million tons from the U.S. Contends Agriculture Secretary John Block: "We are still paying a big price for the 1980 embargo...
...current grain pact, which allows Moscow to buy up to 23 million metric tons a year, expires in September. If it is not renewed, the Soviets might suffer severe food shortages next winter. But soon they would undoubtedly line up alternate grain suppliers as they did during the last embargo. That might have a lasting negative impact on U.S. farm exports. Says John Dunbar, Dean of Agriculture at Kansas State University: "Argentina, Brazil, Canada and Australia would all like long-term deals with Moscow. If we are perceived as an unreliable supplier, a lot of our former business with...