GATHERING OF SCIENTISTS

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21988, 12 January 1937, Page 10

GATHERING OF SCIENTISTS

CONGRESS TO OPEN AT AUCKLAND TO-DAY

AUSTRALIAN MEMBERS ARRIVE

(PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.)

AUCKLAND, January 11

More than 150 members of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science, including delegates from affiliated bodies, and many wives and daughters arrived at Auckland by the Awatea from Sydney to attend the biennial congress, which will open in Auckland to-morrow. Several other Australian members, including the president (Sir Douglas Mawson), reached Auckland from the south at the week-end, among them being a party of geologists who had concluded a tour ot the thermal regions and a visit to Mayor Island, under the guidance of Dr. P. Marshall, an eminent authority on New Zealand geology. The Awatea’s party was led by Senator A. J. McLachlan, Commonwealth Postmaster-General and Minister in charge of Scientific and Industrial Research, and Sir David Rivett, deputy-chairman and chief executive officer of the Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, who is president-elect of the associatlC Among others in the large party were Professor A. E. V. Richardson, one of the three members of the executive committee of the Research Council, Dr. J. J. C. Bradfield, designer of the Sydney harbour bridge, and Sir Stanton Hicks, formerly, of Otago University and now professor of physiology at the University of South Australia. , - ’ Co-operation in Research •

Senator McLachlan is on a goodwill mission, and besides attending the congress will confer with representatives of the Government in Wellington on co-operation between the Commonwealth and the Dominion in research and other matters affecting primary and secondary industries. He intends to make a tour of both islands. Professor Richardson proposes to visit the principal agricultural research institutions when the congress is over. The first congress .gathering will be a civic reception at the Town Hall at mid-day to-morrow, and members of the association will be the guests of Mr and Mrs F. C. Mappin in the afternoon at a garden party at their home in Mountain road. The congress will be officially opened by the GovernorGeneral (Lord Galway) in the Town Hall in the evening, when Sir David Rivett will deliver his presidential address, which is entitled “The Scientific Estate.” The Government will be represented by the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, who is Minister in charge of Scientific and Industrial Research. Among the speakers will be Senator McLachlan. Attendance of 600

All the buildings of Auckland University College have been handed over for meetings of the 16 sections of the congress and the old Grammar School building will also be used. It is expected' that the total number attending will exceed 600. Many New Zealand members are already in Auckland and more are expected to-mor-row. Like the Australian visitors, they include university professors and lecturers, research workers, teachers, industrial scientists. Government officials, and many laymen and women to whom some form of science is a hobby or an avocation. Meetings will continue until January 19 inclusive, and many excursions to places of scientific interest in and near Auckland will be held at the week-end. Most of the Australian visitors will visit Rotorua when the congress is over, the Government having granted liberal fare concessions for rail travel in the North Island.

CO-OPERATION IN RESEARCH

COMMON PROBLEMS OF AUSTRALIA AND N.Z.

PRESIDENT ELECT DISCUSSES VALUE OF CONGRESS

(PBK3S ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.)

AUCKLAND, January 11

The value of holding such conferences as that which will begin to-mor-row, and the good work being done by scientists in New Zealand and Australia, were emphasised by Sir David Rivett, president-elect of the Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science, to-night. Sir David was formerly -Professor of Chemistry at Melbourne University, and since 192? has been deputy-chair-man and chief executive officer of the Commonwealth Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. "The Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science meets every two years to discuss advances in some 15 or 16 different sciences and also to formulate plans for work in the coming years,” said Sir David. “One of the main hopes of the visitors to New Zealand this time is that links may be forged between scientific workers in Australia and New Zealand so that we may be able to. work together more as a team than we have done in the past. "In problems assbciated, for example, with animal health, fruit production, and food preservation and transport, we have immense common interests, and it is only ordinary common sense to make an attack on our problems jointly, and, since on each side our resources are limited, it is incumbent on us to make the best possible use of them,” he continued. “Many of the members of the association, both Australians and New Zealanders, have won distinction throughout the world for their scientific work.

“The papers that are to be presented will be full of interest, and over and above the purely scientific side of the meetings, the congress should prove especially valuable in affording an opportunity tor workers from different parts to meet one another personally,” added Sir David. "The maintenance .of contacts later becomes a much simpler matter when there is personal acquaintance behind them.”

Sir David emphasised the excellence of the scientific work being done in New Zealand and Australia. The standard of work in both countries was very high and he had a, recent opportunity in England to see evidence of the esteem in which it was held. Those engaged on it were working on sound lines, and had received a thorough training in essentials, which enabled them to go on to more advanced and important work. He hoped the congress would bring the work of their scientists to the notice of the people of both countries and the delegates themselves, he said, were looking forward keenly to seeing as much as they could of New Zealand. They- had already been considerably impressed with the. scenery down the West Coast.