Peace, Tolerance Aims Of Farm Exchange Scheme

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31247, 20 December 1966, Page 2

Peace, Tolerance Aims Of Farm Exchange Scheme

Miss Evelyn Graham, of Woodend, has returned after six months in the United States as an International Farm Youth exchangee convinced that the scheme fulfils its ideal of “promoting peace through international understanding.”

“I’m much more tolerant of others and their way of life. Rural youth I met from Europe, America, Latin America, and the East now seem more like brothers and sisters—l feel a much closer kinship with them,” Miss Graham said yesterday.

The programme was founded in the United States in 1948 by the National 4H foundation. This year more than 100 exchanges were taken into American homes in rural areas, and accepted as members of the family. Miss Graham divided her time between Missouri and New Hampshire, staying with five “middle class” families in each State. She met with good will everywhere, although the “independent” New Hampshire people were reserved at first meeting. In Missouri she was struck by the vast amount of corn grown and the many women who helped in the fields.

Acute shortage of farm labour in New Hampshire had led to a decline in farming and much land was returning to woodland.

“The families I stayed with had worked hard for everything they had, and would have to continue working,” Miss Graham said. On issues of Federal Government farm policy, she found the people of New Hampshire more outspoken than those in Missouri. “In Missouri many farmers had unfilled ground, which they called a ‘soil bank.’ They were restricted to a certain acreage to plant and were compensated for the amount left in reserve,” she said. “Some farmers agreed with the policy, but others thought

it had been allowed to continue too long. Now the coun-j try is faced with a farm produce shortage and much of the land will have to be brought back into production." She had read about poverty in the United States but had not been prepared for its extent. “Judging from the sate of many homes I saw in rural towns there was much poverty. In some cases elderly people were attached to their homes, did not want to leave, but were financially unable to repair them,” she said. “In some cases men with large families to support were out of work, because they lacked qualifications. Others worked for wages which were insufficient for their needs.” The problems of world

hunger and over-population provided stimulating discussions at the “mid-point” conference of exchangees Miss Graham attended. She found exchanges tended to view increased food production as the answer to hunger in underdeveloped countries. “All admitted that the rising birth rate was a problem that must be solved, but most advocated an eventual agricultural revolution as the solution, rather than birth control." Sponsorship from banks and business of many kinds greatly assisted the programme in the United States, Miss Graham said. She would very much like to see more assistance given to New Zealanders.