Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 1933. EMPIRE MARKETING.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 53, Issue 150, 6 April 1933, Page 4

Ashburton Guardian Magna est Veritas et Prævalebit. THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 1933. EMPIRE MARKETING.

The report that the Dominion representatives on the Empire Consultative Committee rejected the British suggestion that the Dominions should share the cost of maintaining the Empire Marketing Board, was promptly discounted by a high Australian authority in London. The "Yorkshire Post," which gave publicity to the report, stated as the grounds for the decision that the Dominions believe that the organisation has outlived h$ usefulness. Recently it was cabled that the Board will "disappear" after September 30 next owing to the refusal of the British Government '.o finance it, but later a message from London said that the civil estimates for the current year included a vote of £220,000 for the Board, this being a reduction of £IOO,OOO on the previous State aid. These reports do not put the position clearly, and recourse must be had to a statement made by Mr Coates on his return from the Empire Economic Conference at Ottawa. He then stated that as the granting of Imperial preferences had removed the previous necessity for promoting the sale of Empire products the British Government had announced that it would not continue the existing financing arrangements after next September. As a result, it was arranged that a small committee representing the Empire would make an investigation not only into the Empire Marketing Board, but also in regard to co-ordin- ! ating the work of the eleven different organisations whose functions are more or less complementary to its own. The suggestion was that overlapping, if it existed, could be eliminated. Until this committee reports nothing definite can be said about the future of the Board. The activities of this organisation are of much wider scope than is generally realised. Part of its policy, which was especially commended by the Imperial Conference of 1930, aims at the concentration and development in the most appropriate centres of scientific team work upon problems of interest to the British Commonwealth as a whole. A number of the British universities have received substantial sums to aid agricultural research. About half the allocation for work in connection with the mineral content of pastures went to the Rowlett Research Institute, Aberdeen. Similarly the bulk of the expenditure on dairy research was made in Great Britain. No less than £42,000 has gone to the Imperial Institute of Entomology. The East Maling Horticultural Research Station has received £47,000, and in respect of the marketing of home products the British Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries has been voted nearly a quarter of a million by the Board. It is hardly conceivable that _ what have become great Imperial scientific institutions will be compelled to reduce their usefulness. There may be scope for considerable economies, however, in what is called the field ot economic consultation and co-opera-tion. But in any event, the Dominions doubtless will have to pay for their own commercial publicity and perhaps make larger contributions toward research work within their own territories. The great researches m Britain are not likely to be disturbed. .