Agricultural seminar for bankers

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32459, 20 November 1970, Page 14

Agricultural seminar for bankers

Forty bank managers from Takaka to Invercargill, and an executive from a Trustee .Savings Bank and the Reserve Bank will attend a bankers’ agricultural seminar at Lincoln College next week.

This is the sixth of a series of seminars held for senior bankers in the last three years and the second at Lincoln. It is jointly sponsored by the New Zealand' Bankers' Association and the Agricultural Production Council in the interests of greater efficiency in the farm lending sector of agriculture. Each subject will be introduced by an expert in bis I field and there will be op-i portunities for group discussion. The opening day next Tuesday will cover trends in agriculture. Speakers will include Dr L. R. Wallace, who is director of research for the Department of Agri- ! culture, and Mr A. R. Low, who is Governor of the Reserve Bank. Mr Low will I outline current farm credit policy. Professor J 3. P. Philpott, 1

professor of agricultural economics at the college, will be discussing on Wednesday i the implications of possible British entry into the E.E.C.; . later the same day there will be sessions on development finance for farmers, and the role of the farm accountant. On Thursday morning the bankers will be taken on guided tours to see farming developments. Mr R. O. Smillie, research | director of the New Zealand Bankers’ Association, said! that at such seminars bankers had the opportunity to | study the course of agriculture so that they could I complement their lending skill with the best of advice. The pace of change in agriculture was quickening; and fanners, as a priority sector, I i had the right to expect finan- : cial assistance and advice jfrom bankers who were up-i to-date about the industry. I