Letters

(2 of 4)
The racial views of the C.C.C. are repugnant to me, and I would never have spoken to the group had I known beforehand of its stand. It is absurd and irresponsible for anyone to suggest that one speech--during which I discussed only the impeachment process, as I was asked to do--implies that I in any way share or support the group's view. As the record shows, I don't.

BOB BARR, U.S. REPRESENTATIVE 7th District, Georgia Washington

DOWN ON THE FARM

Our firm represents real estate developer E. Ossie Smith, who was referred to in your story on the attempts by North Carolina farmer Phillip J. Barker to reclaim his family's farm [AMERICAN SCENE, Jan. 25]. You said Smith, who bought the farm at auction, had bulldozed the grave of a Barker family member. Smith had never been advised that there was a grave on the premises. In the process of clearing the land, workmen came upon a small gravesite hidden by brush and overgrowth. Upon finding the grave, Smith stopped work and began to clear and preserve the site. He intends to restore it to proper condition, fence it in and record it in public records, so the cemetery will be preserved in perpetuity. JAMES E. CROSS JR. Royster, Cross, Currin & Winfrey Oxford, N.C.

FOOD FIGHTS, TRADE TIFFS

Your story "Banana Wars," on trade agreements and restrictions [BUSINESS, Feb. 8], painted a one-sided picture of the dilemma. The dependency of Caribbean islands like St. Vincent and the Grenadines on bananas for hard currency far outweighs Chiquita's need to maintain market share in Europe. Perhaps if Chiquita's chairman, Carl Lindner, had not spent so much time and money lobbying Congress and the White House, his company would not have "lost money four of the past five years." It's been said that business is war, and wars cost money. Chiquita is at war with the eastern Caribbean, and that is why the company has lost money, not because the E.U. has subsidized poor nations. T. CARL JACKSON Ozona, Fla.

The focus of your report was very narrow, concentrating on the trade war that concerns only the 13% of worldwide banana production that is exported. The real banana war is the one that concerns the more than half a billion people in developing countries of the tropics, for whom different types of bananas are a staple food crop. In this war, people are battling the diseases and pests that are becoming more and more rampant. Average yields achieved by the small farmers who depend on this crop are one-tenth of those on the large multinational plantations. But the small farmers' harvests don't have to remain small. Research can successfully address production problems by developing higher-yielding varieties of banana plants that have built-in resistance to pests and diseases. EMILE FRISON, DIRECTOR International Network for Banana and Plantain Montpellier, France

BONFIRE OF THE POLITICOS