SECONDARY INDUSTRIES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 16, 20 January 1931, Page 6

SECONDARY INDUSTRIES.

Your correspondent who signs himself "Secondary Industries" simply shows his colos-: sal ignorance when he attacks the farmers and farming generally. His remarks concerning- '■ secondary industries are really laughable. If it were not for the burden of the protected , secondary industries, buttcrfat could still be ; . produced for ninepence per pound and wop] ;■ and mutton at an equally low parity. If we had free trade within the Empire and our boots, -clothing, farm implements —in .fact, all a farmer's needs —came in duty free there j would be no "squeal J, coming from the farrasr. Living would be much cheaper and we would be producing.twice as much ae we can do now. It would not-matter to the farmers if we did not sell a single pound of butter, or, for that matter, of wool, mutton or hides in this country. AJI we want is a fair spin, i.e., to but :' our produce at the world's parity plus the : freights and storage. The sooner our people accept these facts the sooner we will get back to prosperity. Many farmers will be forced off the land to swell the liste of the unemployed during the present crisis, and it will,;be -the "concessions" paid to the secondary industries under the guise of protection that will be mainly responsible for this. PRIMARY INDUSTRIES!