1584                            LAWS OF MARYLAND                       [CH. 727

CHAPTER 727
(House Bill 407)

AN ACT to add new Sections 83A through 83V 83W to Article 66C
of the Annotated Code of Maryland (1957 Edition), title "Natural
Resources," to follow immediately after Section 83 thereof and
to be under the new subtitle "Promotion of Use and Sale of
Agricultural Products," authorizing the establishment of associa-
tions to promote agricultural commodities, and providing gen-
erally for the promotion and procedures of such associations.

Section 1. Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Maryland,
That new Sections 83A through 83V 83W be and that they are hereby
added to Article 66C of the Annotated Code of Maryland (1957
Edition), title "Natural Resources," to follow immediately after
Section 83 thereof and to be under the new subtitle "Promotion of
Use and Sale of Agricultural Products," and to read as follows:

Promotion of Use and Sale of Agricultural Products
83A.

It is declared to be in the interest of the public welfare that the
Maryland farmers who are producers of livestock, poultry, field crops
and other agricultural products, including cattle, swine, sheep,
broilers, turkeys, commercial eggs, potatoes, peaches, apples, berries,
tobacco, vegetables and other fruits of all kinds, NURSERY STOCK
as well as bulbs and flowers and other agricultural products having
a domestic or foreign market, shall be permitted and encouraged to
act jointly and in cooperation with growers, handlers, dealers and
processors of such products in promoting and stimulating, by adver-
tising and other methods, the increased production, use and sale,
domestic and foreign, of any and all of such agricultural commodities.

83B.

The passage by the Seventy-Ninth Congress of a law designated
as Public Law 733, and more particularly Title II of that act, cited
as "Agricultural Marketing Act of 1946," makes it all the more im-
portant for producers, handlers, processors and others of specific
agricultural commodities to associate themselves in action programs,
separately and with public and private agencies, to obtain the great-
est and most immediate benefits under the provisions of such law,
in respect to research, studies and problems of marketing, trans-
portation and distribution.

83C.

No association, meeting or activity undertaken in pursuance of
the provisions of this article and intended to benefit all of the pro-
ducers, handlers and processors of a particular commodity shall be
deemed or considered illegal or in restraint of trade.

83D.

It is hereby further declared to be in the public interest and
highly advantageous to the agricultural economy of the State that