Changes Seen In Farming

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30769, 5 June 1965, Page 9

Changes Seen In Farming

At the end of this month Mr D. C. Richardson, who is well known in the stock and station agency business in Canterbury and Marlborough, will retire after being in the service of the New Zealand Farmers’ CoOperative Association since 1917. Since 1948 he has been senior execu-

tive officer controlling the association's wool department, stock department. land department, and farmers’ banking department. In his 48-odd years with the association, for many years intimately associated with the financial side of farming operations, Mr Richardson has shared with farmers in good and bad times and has seen a revolution in fanning in the province.

In the early 1930 s he remembers the dark days of the depression when the association, heavily involved in advances to farmers, entered into adjustments of farmers’ liabilities, under the provissios of the Mortgagors’ and Lessees’ Rehabilitation Act and wrote a very substantial sum off farmers’ indebtedness. At this time members of the staff associated with farming had to spend long hours preparing budgets and assisting in discussions with solicitors and appearing before the Mortgagors’ and Lessees’ Rehabilitation Commission.

Now the picture has changed, and with high land values and the incidence of death duties Mr Richardson said that farmers were being forced to take action to preserve their porperties or assets for their children. Working in close association with accountants and solicitors they were forming land-hold-ing companies and trusts to achieve this objective, and this seemed to be working out quite satisfactorily. In the days of the depression this sort of arrangement had been unnecessary, he said, but today a property that had made a profit of £l6B in the depression returned a profit of about £5OOO, and a good farm that had been worth £lO,OOO then was today worth £50.000 or more. Mr Richardson sees the reason for high land values in a shortage of land with the increase in population and numbers of people wanting land and the increasing recognition of farming as a way of life. In spite of subidivision of properties and settlement of new land, he said, the New : Zealand Year Book showed I that between 1937 and 1957 [there was actually a reduc[tion in the number of land I holdings. ■ In the future Mr Richardson I believes that in spite of, per- : haps some ebb and flow, farm land values over a period of

time will continue to rise further, and he believes that there will be a particular premium for flat land which is easier and less costly to work. It is his view that, in spite of some shortcomings, farming is the best way of life in New Zealand today.

When he first came into contact with farmers, draught horses were still the main motive power on the farm, and he says that mechanisation has been one of the main factors in increasing farm production. There has also been the assistance that farmers have received from agencies like the Department of Agriculture, Lincoln College and the catchment boards in the field of soil conservation. Before the 1930-32 period, he recalls that little topdressing was done. Light land, he says, has shown the most remarkable progress and land that he can remember being sold for £3 an acre is now worth £5O or more. Wool Increase One result of the advances in farming has been the marked increase in wool handled by the firm—a 100 per cent increase between 1946-47 and 1958-59. Farming was now becoming a business, said Mr Richardson, and whereas farmers’ sons once left school as early as possible so that they could come home and carry some of the burden of the hard manual work involved in farming, they were now able to advance their education so that new men coming into farming almost invariably had much greater educational opportunities than earlier generations.

Mr Richardson was born in England and came to Canterbury with his parents when he was eight years old. He was educated at East Christchurch and Richmond schools, and West Christchurch High School. For about a year he worked for “Truth” preparing to be a reporter and then in 1917 he joined the Farmers as an office junior at 10s a week. The boys who delivered and collected the mails were then receiving 5s a week. Soon he was transferred to the association’s fertiliser works at Belfast where he was in charge of the office. After World War I he returned to the head office of the company in town and was for a time at the cool stores in Bedford row. In 1928 he began working in the banking department, dealing with farmers’ current accounts and in 1932 he was appointed inspector and officer controlling farmers’ banking accounts. In 1963 Mr Richardson was appointed a director of the association. Mr V. C. North, who is taking Mr Richardson’s place, has been appointed manager of the stock and station

division with overall responsibility for stock, wool, land and farmers’ banking accounts. Born in Christchurch and educated at Richmond school and Christchurch Boys’ High School, Mr North joined the Farmers in 1929 when he left school. In- that year he was transferred to the banking department and was then associated with Mr Richardson until 1943 when he became assistant accountant. From 1948 until early this year he was branch manager for the association in Ashburton. Mr W. L. Laine has been appointed assistant manager of the stock and station division.