HARVEST LABOUR

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 212, 8 September 1941, Page 8

HARVEST LABOUR

STUDENTS MAY HELP

POOLING OF RESOURCES

The suggestion that the labour difficulty in connection with the coming harvest would be assisted to a large extent by the utilising of all available machinery and the pooling of resources of machinery and labour in the various districts was made at the meeting of the Auckland District Council of Primary Production this morning by Mr. A. Best. Mr. Best said that many farmers were using obsolete methods of harvesting and considered that depots of farm machinery could be set up and harvesting done by contract.

The chairman, Mr. R. C. Clark, said the bottleneck was labour. There were some contractors who could not obtain men to work their machinery. He considered that secondary schoolboys and university and training college students could assist in this direction if their Christmas holidays commenced at an earlier date. Some assistance might also be gained if public works were stopped for the summer months.

Examinations might prove a difficulty in advancing the date of school holidays, except in the case of training colleges, stated Mr. H. Barter. It was decided to write to the Dominion Council asking if representations might be made for training colleges to commence their holidays at an earlier date so that students could help with the harvesting.