AGRICULTURAL MATTERS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1211, 21 August 1911, Page 8

AGRICULTURAL MATTERS.

TIIE MINISTER INTERVIEWED. IB} Telegraph.—Press Association.) Christchurch, August 1!). ( Tho Minister for Agriculture, the Hon. T. Mackenzie, in the course of a brief interview. 5.1 id that the Seeds Control and Noxious Weeds Bills had a fair prospect of getting through this session. /Pho Seeds Control Bill, Mr. Mackenzie said, was merely n beginning, and the principle contained in it could he widened in the future. They wo>ld have to work up to the point of securing satisfactory germination nnd reliable .-trains of s«ds, and see that the cultivation for seed purposes should he carried out under such conditions as would on Mire to the farmer a high quality of the particular plant he desired. For" instance, tlie.y would take a year from the time they sowed turnip seed till it was threshed out. 31 any farmers simply gathered seed from turnips that might have, been sown with their ordinary crop late in the spring. That, of eor;.so, was not the right system ; the seed grown must be remote enough 'from other varieties to prevent cross fertilisation.

31r. Mackenzie said that the A. and P. Association Conference had been a most satisfactory one. Personally he had been most gratified at tho appreciative remarks passed regarding the work of the Agricultural Department, and the expressionsof goodwill towards himself. The president made' it quite clear that the conference was above party, and that the delegates were there for the simple pnrposo of advancing the agricultural and pastoral interests of the .country. It would have been impossible had it been i party organisation for tho conference to have been opened by his Tlxcellency the Governor, or for tho Minister for Agriculture and other members of Parliament to have been present and taken tl» part in the proceedings which they had taken. STOCK INSPECTORS; POISONS BILL. Tim;iru, August 20.. The local A. and P. Association is supporting the Westland Association in asking tile Department of Agriculture to appoint qualified veterinarians as inspectors of stock in back-country districts. Tho association also resolved that tho Poisons Bill was detrimental to stockowners and fruit-growers through tho inconvenience of personal application for poisons for sheep dips and spraying materials and through , the monopoly given to chemists. A protest will lie sent to tho Minister, in charge of the Bill.