1966 Royal Show To Be Held In Christchurch

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30803, 15 July 1965, Page 23

1966 Royal Show To Be Held In Christchurch

The council of the Royal Agricultural Society of New Zealand has authorised the Canterbury Agricultural and Pastoral Association to conduct the 1966 Royal show. A letter announcing this was read to a meeting of the association’s committee yesterday. A Royal show was last held in Christchurch in 1960. This year’s show will be held in Palmerston North, on November 4, 5 and 6. A new system of Royal show schedules was approved by the council during the recent series of meetings of the Roval Agricultural Society in Wellington, said the secretary (Mr H. M. Studholme) in his report to the committee. “The question was raised by a Canterbury suggestion that natural-condition sheep sections be cut out at Canterbury Royal shows because there is little demand for these sections and because they are exceedingly expensive to run,” said Mr Studholme. Host associations, it was also suggested, should be relieved from including in their schedules classes which were most unlikely to be filled.

Under the new system, a host association would submit to breed societies, for their comment, a proposed schedule. If approved by the Unitec Breed Societies’ Association, it would then be recommended to the council of the Royal Agricultural Society for approval. North island shows were likely to ask for the elimination or reduction of sections for Merinos, Corriedales, halfbreds. and perhaps other breeds, he said. “If the soc, eties responsible for those

breeds agree, the Royal schedule will appear with the suggested elimination or reduction. If a breed society wants classes retained or increased, it will ask for what it wants, but will be expected to give some assurance that the classes will be filled to a standard appropriate to a Royal show.” Breed societies would thus be assured that inferior stock would not win Royal awards when Royal shows were held in centres where their particular breed was only thinly represented, Mr Studholme said. The vice-president of the Canterbury association, Mr E. G. O. Rutherford, of Hamner Springs, had been elected junior vice-president of the Royal Agricultural Society, Mr Studholme reported. Flock Ram Fairs A recommendation that the ring selling method be adopted for flock ram fairs was -ontained in a letter from North Canterbury Federated Farmers. Made by a sub-com-mittee which had conferred with the Canterbury Agricultural and Pastoral Association, the recommendation had been confirmed by the meat and wool section’s executive. “It is understood that ring celling used to be the practice, and is favoured as offering more protection to the buyer, who can see the stock noving around before actually bidding,”'a further letter stated. The meeting decided to invite Federated Farmers to send representatives to the next meeting of the association’s sheep committee to discuss the recommendation.