Medal-winner man of many parts

Press, 29 May 1981, Page 20

Medal-winner man of many parts

By

JOHN GOULTER

Alan Scott, of Kiwaka. the recipient of this years Bledisloc Medal from Lincoln College, has reached the top in horticulture, hut he says that he is just as much an agricultural man.

His career — and it is for achievements in fostering the growth of New Zealand’s primary products that the Bledisloc Medal is awarded ■ - reflects an interest and involvement in both sectors. The award was instigated in 1930 al the time of Lincoln College's fiftieth jubilee by the Governor-General, Lord Bledisloc. Himself an eminent agriculturalist, he presented the medal as a token of his admiration for the training given at Lincoln. Since then it has become the college's prestige award, going each year to an old student who has most thoroughly pul into practice the training he received at Lincoln. Alan Scott attended Lincoln College in 1941 and 1946. and in between came four years active naval service. In 1946 he was a gold medallist in the diploma of agriculture course. He was awarded, too. the Southdown Society gold medal for excellence in animal husbandry, and even today he says that his first love is in breeding stock.

In 1948 he bought 12 acres of run-down orchard and eight and a half acres of pasture in two separate blocks. Alan says that a good part of the land he went on to at Riwaka was swamp, and the first thing he had to do was embark on an ambitious clearing programme.

"I had to use cattle as discs. The rushes were so high that wheel or crawler tractors bellied on them, so I bought some four and five-

year-old wild cattle from Wanganui. Wanganui was famous for its wild cattle in those days, "We had to drive them in ourselves and then, armed with two good dogs. I force fed them on rushes. They punched the rushes into the ground, and then 1 could move in and plough it.” Establishing his orchard. Alan Scot! soon began experimenting with intensive, apple culture on improved rootstocks. After five years he had lifted yields to’ 4000 buhsels per acre over a small area. On stony soils he experimented with soil improvement through the introduction of organic material, and he was one of the first growers in the Motueka, district to appreciate that pasture and trees could complement each other well.

Today his property is one of the most productive units in the district.

But Alan Scott has also made a contribution in the administration and marketing of the. fruit industry. He says that this involvement has had a significant effect on his approach as a grower. Rising through provincial growers' associations and committees, he was involved in two commissions of inquiry into apple and pear marketing in New Zealand. He was known as an active promoter of controlled marketing, proposing a pattern which was to form the basis of the international marketing of apples and pears. From 1974 to 1980 he was growers’ representative on the New Zealand Apple and Pear Marketing Board. "My whole attitude as a grower has reversed as a

result of those six years. Beforehand if I was looking at a new variety I merely thought about whether I could grow it and if. I would enjoy growing it. "Now I would ask myself three questions: Will it sell? Can it be’ serviced in terms of storage and shipping? Can I grow it? And on the basis of all those things I have then got to decide if it is worth trying.” "Planned strategic marketing is the key to New Zealand's survival as an exporter of primary products," he says, and this was the message he gave the Lincoln College Old Students' Association when he presented the toast to the college at their dinner. “We must move towards a common policy to market all New Zealand's primary produce on a 'One Desk Sell' basis, and thus command respect in the market place. We should work together in the formation of a strong marketing force, to gradually move closer together meat, wool, dairy, forestry, fish, and fruit — for New Zealand's common good."

He says that New Zealand adopted these policies during wartime. “We combined our effort in a coalition. It is an economic war in today's market place, and we must combine our marketing forces."

To Alan Scott, whether working with animals, the land, or in growing fruit, his career is an attempt to "make sense as well as money." The sense -he talks about is common sense, and he says that if he deserves the Bledisloc Medal at all it is for putting to work in a practical way the down-to-earth approach which was encouraged at Lincoln.