INCREASED FARM PRODUCTION

Press, Volume LXXXVI, Issue 26129, 3 June 1950, Page 9

INCREASED FARM PRODUCTION

COMMENTS BY MR C. HILGENDORF

“ MUST BE AN ADEQUACY OF LABOUR ”

If there was to be any significant increase in larin production mere must be an adequacy oi iaini labour, saiu tne president <Mr u.. Biigenuuri) at the annual conference of ivnd-Can-terbury * ederaced f armers held at /isnburton yesterday. it was sometimes maintained mat by improved management and increased mecaanisation, production had been greatly increased curing the last 20 years in spite of a steadily failing farm population.

‘1 see no likelihood of this state of affairs continuing,” he said. “There is a great deal of farm work where mechanisation can almost be ruled out. This is so both in farm development and maintenance work but particularly so in the case of stock, in agricultural farming more machinery must have more men to operate it; in pastoral farming more stock must be tended by more men and yet the demand for farm labour is not so overwhelming as might be expected.

“Among the reasons were that farm workers were no longer merely labourers. if they ever were. They must be as skilful as the best tradesmen and a good deal more versatile. No farmer would willingly leave machinery or stock worth many hundreds of pounds in charge of anyone but a

competent man. Farms could not be run with a rapidly changing labour force partly because supervision, such as was possible in factories, was.out of the question. “Station cook houses had largely disappeared.” Mr Hilgendorf said.

“Country women were increasingly reluctant to cook continuously for extra men and indeed the principle that the wife was expected gratuitously to feed her husband’s employees did not hold in other callings. There was not enough accommodation in the country for extra married men and married labour was a good deal more expensive than single men. “Like many others I feel that this is the heart of the problem. There must be many more houses on farms and in the villages. If the country as a whole wants more imoorts and a higher standard of living it must make this possible. The farmer must be in a position to attract and hold the best labour by offering the best pay and the best conditions.

“Incidentally it is perhaps not greatly recognised how well-off many married farm workers are. taking into consideration both nay and allowances. Compared with his opnosite number in town bis standard of living is as high, his hours of work not unduly long, his onnortunity to save greater and his opportunitv for advancement fully eaual—in suite of some assertions to the contrary.”