Not top farmers of world

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33058, 27 October 1972, Page 10

Not top farmers of world

A Waipara farmer, Mr J. S. J. McCaskey, who has recently returned from an overseas trip during which he made a study of farming trends, says that he is convinced that the much-quoted saying, “the New Zealand farmer is the most efficient in the world,” is a myth kept alive for political reasons.

Writing from Britain at the end of August, he said that it was probable New Zealand held a world record for the number of acres and livestock managed per man, but that was where it finished. “My close contact with farmers on their farms in the United Kingdom, in southern United States, Denmark, and the Netherlands has left me with the indelible impression that most of these people are experts and enthusiasts in farming really going somewhere —not like New Zealand farmers ‘running to stand still’.” Mr McCaskey puts the blame for the rather stagnant state of New Zealand farming on Government policy, such as that on the import of farm tools of trade. On average, he says, the New Zealand fanner pays twice as much as his European competitors for many of his machines. “The most oppressive feeling I have encountered on this trip,” said Mr McCaskey, “has been the fact that people are sick of the society that has developed in their home country. Indeed, because of what they say, I am glad that I do not have to live with them. Many find that the rewards for initiative and skill gained through experience no longer exist, and they have lost heart and self-respect to some extent. “I have lost count of the number of Americans and British who have asked me if they could get a better life in New Zealand,” he said. “One American knew of New Zealand only as a place where strikes were commonplace and the economy was in chaos . . . that was from what he read in the press. “So how did I answer the question? ‘Yes, at present you will probably find a better life and a standard of living close to what you are used to; but do not be surprised if you find a country hell bent along the same trails of disaster as have overtaken the United Kingdom and the United States.’ “Do you read of strikes and chaos in Mexico? No.

National policy is quite plainly: ‘lf you are able to work and do not, you do not eat.’ Cross the border into the United States and the first thing that hits you is a vast country still chock full of potential, but thousands who will not work because they can eat. And the situation is the same in Britain. Mr McCaskey said that he was sure that these comments would find a sympathetic response from many thousands of genuine New Zealanders, who cared about their country. Writing at a time when the wool-acquisition controversy was raging in New Zealand, Mr McCaskey said that the wool production industry in the United Kingdom had been much more fragmented and chaotic than that in New Zealand, but it was now in a happy and peaceful state, from what he could gauge from farmer reaction. Had the New Zealand Wool Board issued specimen pamphlets along the lines of those available from the British Wool Marketing Board, he believed that much of the trouble would have been avoided. . “I have with me a publication of the British Wool Marketing Board explaining how it works, and another containing the 1972 season prices for 760 grades of wool, plus notes on insurance, transport, and such things as penalties deduct- i ible for faulty preparation ! and appeals against valua- i tion. I look forward to i being able to draw up my budget with such informa’tion, but I have not the slightest intention of backing the setting up of another Governmentsponsored and controlled bureaucracy . . .” In conclusion, Mr I McCaskey said that he had: a word of warning about a I commodity which is the | livelihood of some New > Zealanders — apples. He; feared that United Kingdom entry into the European Economic Community would virtually wipe out New Zealand’s apple market. The first part of Mr McCaskey’s. comments was published last week.