FUTURE OF NEW ZEALAND FARMING

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28701, 26 September 1958, Page 2 (Supplement)

FUTURE OF NEW ZEALAND FARMING

Present Healthy State THE FARMING INDUSTRY today is in an extremely healthy state and in normal circumstances would be on the threshold of expansion ahd advancement at a rate in excess of the average of recent years. It is unfortunate that marketing difficulties for some of our principal products have clouded the horizon, but I am sure the set* backs will be only temporary. There will inevitably be a period of uncertainty while these problems are being overcome, but I would strongly recommend that no precipitate decisions should be taken to alter fundamentally the general pattern of our production. Our farming has been established on a sound basis of economic production that takes full advantage of our unexcelled natural advantages. We are correcting some of the mistakes of the past and research workers are rapidly assembling a vast amount of new knowledge. We undoubtedly could and should be more self sufficient in cereals and seeds, and the increased acreage in grain crops could be attained without any reduction in other forms of production or detriment to fertility levels, provided sound rotations are observed. The ratio of cattle to sheep could in any case be increased with advantages to management in many districts, and as present prices and immediate prospects for beef seem good, some expansion in this direction would seem well worth while. Until the dairy products marketing future clarifies a little it seems advisable to slacken emphasis on this type of production. There is enough flexibility within the primary production industry to enable these adjustments to be made in parrying the economic buffeting we are suffering at the moment; but nothing more than this seems justified and I am sure our best hope meanwhile is to keep our industry and our land in good nick to take full advantage of a rapidly expanding world demand for the products we are so well able to supply.

C. F. SKINNER,

Minister of Agriculture.