ELIMINATING WASTE

Auckland Star, Volume XLIX, Issue 11, 12 January 1918, Page 6

ELIMINATING WASTE

IN MILITARY CAMPS. Accompanied by the Minister of Defence the Efficiency Board paid a visit to Feathereton Camp on Thursday. A thorough inspection of the camp was made by the members of the Board and of the measures taken to eliminate waste. While there they were asked to make any suggestions they might thinly proper for the more economical management of the camp. One of the members of the Board suggested that Dr. Hight, Professor of Economics at Canterbury College, might be able to offer valuable suggestions, and the Minister of Defence lias asked Dr. Hight to visit the camp at his earliest convenience. This is in pursuance of the efforts that have been made during the past few months in the camps to economise in food. Under the supervision of Mr. Ewcn, of Sargood, Son, and Ewen, a number of economies have already been effected in the camps. Speaking on this question, the Minister of Defence stated that they were studying the subject from the practical and scientific standpoint. The Efficiency Board might be able to offer suggestions which the authorities v would be glad to adopt. In the early days of the camps the chief concern was with the equipment, training, and dispatch of men. Now they had time to think about economies, and they were doing it even to such a detail as the peeling of potatoes. They were considering whether they could save T)y more complete centralisation, and they might find, for instance, that it would be more economical to have all the potatoes peeled at one place, instead of at the several cook shops throughout the camps, and to distribute the potatoes after they were peeled. This applied also to meat. Such large quantities of food wore being used that even small losees amounted in the aggregate to considerable losses. Inquiries and investigations had 'been made as to how other concerns iißing large quantities set about the prevention of waste, but up to the present the authorities had been able to learn nothing from any of them, and it was probable that they had something to learn from the Defence Department.