MONEY SPENT ON RESEARCH

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25264, 16 August 1947, Page 6

MONEY SPENT ON RESEARCH

WOOL BOARD’S TOTAL OF £l4OO Out of an income of £136,000 in the year ended June 30, 1947, the New Zealand Wool Board spent £1394 on scientific research, according to the accounts published with the annual report. * Of this sum, £477 was spent on financing three research officers on a visit to Australia, so that they could find out what was being done in the Commonwealth; £5OO was maae as a grant to the Woollen Mills Research Association; and £417 was paid to the Veterinary Services Council. The report records that the three scientists on their return submitted a comprehensive report to the board, with a number of recommendations on research work in New Zealand. The board is financing a Wool Board scholarship at Otago University, the work undertaken being a study of shrink proofing of wool. The grant to the Woollen Mills Research Association is being used in a study of the finishing of wool textiles.

This activity seems to be a little restricted and unimaginative. It is not easy to see why money should be spent even in insignificant amounts on such projects as shrink-proofing and the finishing of textiles, which can undoubtedly be much better handled in the great textile centres of the Empire. New Zealand’s small contribution may be only part of a general plan, but if that is so, the report does not make it clear.

More hope seems to lie in the statement that the board has held further conferences with the Meat Board to try to arrive at some scheme which will embrace animal husbandry and wool fibre research.

With the object lesson of the Dairy Board before them, the Wool Board and the Meat Board should not take long to convince themselves that research pays, even though it may seem expensive. Research into the wqol up to the stage at which it is sold offers almost limitless scope for scientific investigation