DAIRY INDUSTRY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 128, 2 June 1938, Page 8

DAIRY INDUSTRY.

EXPANSION DISAPPROVED.

OTHER AGRARIAN SCHEMES. Doubts were expressed by the migration committee of the Five Million Club in its report released" to-day on the population requirements of the Dominion of the desirability of expanding the dairy industry much beyond its present capacity.

"The largest individual agricultural industry in this country is the dairying industry," said the report. "But expressed in terms of International commerce it is fundamentally the least sound. Practically every country in tile world could become self-supporting in regard to dairy products. The sole reason why such nations as England have not up to the present become selfsupporting is that butter and cheese can be produced more cheaply in Xew Zealand, Denmark and the Ualtio States."

If butter prices became too high there was a tendency for the import market to turn to the consumption of margarine. The meat and wool markets were not affected to the same degree, but neither lent themselves to closer settlement to the same extent as the dairy industry, nor did they employ the same amount of labour. It was felt that any large expansion of the industry might tend to develop a type of peasant farmer whose standard of living would be consistently dropping below average owing to the necessity of retaining vital export markets. The efficacy of a guaranteed price for dairy produce, if production were greatly increased, would have to be measured by the total cost of the guarantee to the community as a whole. The temptation offered by the a<feptability of the industry to closer settlement schemes should in the opinion of the committee be approached cautiously.

New Zealand agriculture ves already lacking in resilience, and that rigidity had proved iteelf in the past a source of eerkras economic embarrassment. "We believe that all future schemes for agricultural difvelopment should have as their objective the greater diversification of agrarian employment," continued the report. "We are forced to the conclusion, in face of these facts, that the degree of expansion in the dairy industry, in spite of its attraction for closer settlement, is strictly limited. The production of meat and wool, on the other hand, appears to offer opportunities for further development, but neither of tehse industries can be expected to absorb large numbers of migrants. In our opinion agrarian settlemept schemes should be designed with the object of developing other forms of agriculture . . ."