The Press SATURDAY, MARCH 30, 1963. School Of Forestry Proposal

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30094, 30 March 1963, Page 10

The Press SATURDAY, MARCH 30, 1963. School Of Forestry Proposal

The Canterbury Progress League is wise to press its case for the re-establishment of a university school of forestry in Canterbury. The university council, which should itself be actively arguing its claims to such a school, needs all the public support it can get, reinforced, if possible, by endowments. The time is opportune to revive interest in the school. The situation is very different from what it was when the deadlock between the New Zealand University Senate and the Forest Service caused the abandonment of the plan to open a school in Auckland and the setting up of a lesser institution at Rotorua, which does not at all meet the needs of New Zealand. We now have a new Director of Forestry and a new Minister, as was pointed out at the Progress League meeting; we also have autonomous universities, which are able, within limits, to compete with each other. Canterbury is singularly well placed competitively, because it is centrally situated and has the land that Auckland and Wellington lack for economic expansion, including the halls to accommodate the generation of full-time students that has begun to appear. If more land is needed for expansion it is available, and now is the time to buy it. Canterbury could well be the largest university in New Zealand provided its development is fostered by the community that has so much to gain

from its growth. Commercially, Christchurch would find it profitable to invest in an institution that could become the city’s biggest industry, far more valuable than any new manufacturing industry that is likely to be attracted here. A beginning of expansion could be made with a forestry school, which does not depend on the good will of the Minister of Forests. If Canterbury can put a sufficiently attractive proposition before the University Grants Committee it will be accepted. The people ol Palmerston North are being interested in a somewhat similar opportunity for university expansion; but Canterbury has a good start on Massey College, and it should keep it. Canterbury’s claim to a forestry school does not depend principally on the university’s potential for expansion. The status of Christchurch as the botanical centre of New Zealand, the university’s strong scientific tradition, and the proximity of a wide variety of important indigenous and exotic forests are among the reasons that make Canterbury a logical site. The relevance of the future growth of the university is in stimulating public support for a major development. As to the need for a university school of forestry in New Zealand, the increase in timber exports is less significant than the protection of farm lands. But both make forestry a matter of prime importance tc the national economy.