MANDATES OF PACIFIC.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 136, 11 June 1927, Page 17

MANDATES OF PACIFIC.

PROBLEMS TO BE FACED. There was a large attendance at the fortnightly luncheon of the Auckland branch of the Leagne of Nations held the Piccadilly Eooms. Darby Street. Mr. E. C. Cutten presided. Mr. L. A. ilander said the proposal to deal with a subject snch as the problems of the mandates of the Pacific in twenty minutes was attempting to put a bombshell into a nutshell. His object was to touch upon particularly the problems which the authorities had to face in New Guinea and Samoa. These included depopulation as far as New Guinea was concerned and declining birth rate. The latter was due to various causes. One was that there were certain kind people in the past who sent old clothes to the islands for the natives, and these it was to be feared had introduced new disease. Recruiting had been another cause of depopulation, but that was now about ended. The abolition t>f bead-hunting had also done away with a lot of customs connected with it. and tlie result was that many natives iii New Guinea had lost interest. Another cause was the clash of customs.

Mr. Mander stressed the point that in] both New Guinea and Samoa work' should be on the lines of village communities. 11l Samoa the Administration was "Toellent work. The system of central villase life must also be encouraged in New Guinea. Education must be designed to suit village life, the matter of secondary education not being imperative at the present time. In Samoa native girls were now being trained for nurses, and some boys were being pre pared for the medical profession. The aim was not to make Europeans of the Samoans, but to make them better The result was that a far finer ideal of life was being worked out for those people. Mr. Mander was accorded a vote of thanks on the motion of the