FARMERS AND THE WAR

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3061, 24 April 1917, Page 10

FARMERS AND THE WAR

A STRIKING VINDICATION

In tho courso of lis address at In-' vorcargill on tho work of tho National Efficiency Board, the Otago and Southland Commissioner, Mr. W. D. Hunt, said :—

While speakiiig of our farmers) I would just like to say a few words in connection with what I consider are very wrong statements that have been mado about them somowhat freely of late. They have been accused of being greedy and grasping, of wanting to exploit tho townspeople. They have been accused of refusing to grow wheat simply because something else paid them better, and they have been told that they should bo compelled to grow wheat. Wo have been told that farmers as- compared with townspeople get far more than their share of the world's goods, etc,

I claim to know tho farmers as few men know them, I have had opportu- ! nitios of knowing them that few men . have had. My father was a small work- . ing farmer, and I worked on his farm until I was grown up. ffir some years after that I was working manager on another man's property. For the last twenty-fivo years it lias been my daily 'work attending to tho financial affairs of a good inafly hundred farmers doing business with the company that I manage, and for many years as well I have been farming on my own account. I have seen hundreds of farmors succeed, and I have seen scores of them fail, and, I know bow they accomplish any success that-they meet with. Thoy do it by intensely hard ivork, and by saving every sixpence that thoy con." They work early and late, and often seven days a week. Their frugal and thrifty habits are forced on .them in two ways. Tho one is that thoy are always requiring money to make necessary improvements on their farms, to buy additional stock and plant as tho producing capacity of their farms improved, and to meet their various financial engagements. Tho other way in which thoy are forced to savo is that thoy havo to work so 'hard that they have not time to spend money in enjoyment or pleasure. With ono exception there is no class i'u the.community that works so hard and takes so little tirao off for plcasuro as tho averago farmer. I said I made this statement with ono exception. That exception is tho farmors wife. She is to my mind tho hardestworked member of tho community. She is tho real backbono of tho country, and is desorving of the respect aJid gratitude of every ono of us. When you consider that if a man during his working lifetime, say, from tho time ho is twenty until ho is forty-five, were/ to save only the sum of Is. per day and accumulate it at 5 per cont. interest, it would amount to £2900; and to rotirb on a- comfortable fortuno of £10,000 only requires tho saving and accumulation at 5 per cent, of a sum of 3s. sd. a day for the same period, one ceases to wonder that many farmers aro ablo to retire in comparative comfort in their old aso. The Wheat Question. Then the farmer's attitude ou the wheat question is entirely raisunderby townspeople. This wheat question is almost entirely a South Island one. It is a question of cultivation, and the South Island is the cultivation area; the North Island is chiefly grazing. The latest complete cultivation figures available aro thoso of the 1911 census. In that year approximately.2,ooo.ooo acres we're under cultivation in Now Zealand, of which only 400,000 acres wore iii the North Island and 1.600,000 acres in tho Souths Of this 2,000,000 acres 322,000 acres wore iu wheat, 33,000 in barlov, and 302,000 in oats. The remaining 1,350,000 acres .were practically all winter and fattening feed for stock. The wheat and probably half the oats and barley would bo grown for sale, and tho other half of tho oats and barley would bo grown for the farmer's own stock. Thus of the 2,000.000 acres only 500.0,10 acres were grain for sale, and 1,500,000 acres were feed for stock. That is out of overy four ar»res cultivated three were to grow feed to bo eaten by tho stock -on the farms, and one to grow' grain for sale.

Now let us consider for' a moment the position sinco the war began from the farmer's point of view. Out of every four effective male workers ono has already gone away as a Soldier, and if. the war lasts another year the proportion will bo one in three. Tho agricultural and pastoral industries have lost probably as heavily as other industries. With one man in four gono and the proportion moving up towards one in_ three,' work has had to be reduced in other industries. Like every other industry the farmer has tp cut out that which is of least importance to him and keep up that which is of most importance. Almost every, farmer's main line is stock. Grain growing for sale is a side line. The most laborious work on a farm is cultivation, and when the available labour is reduced this must of necessity be Teduced, also. But the farmer must maintain his usual supply of stock food. Ho has the stock and he must either feed them or sell them. If his feed is reduced his stock must be reduced also. But unless some other farmerhas grown a surplus'of fecd\there will be no one to buy his stock. It is obvious, therefore, that the farmers in the aggregate must grow enough feed to winter their stock and fatten their surplus. If thev do not do this they are faced with disaster as far as their stock are concerned. It is not a question of which will give them the most income—grain or stock feed. Stock feed is necessary to protect their capital, quite apart from the question of income. If sufficient stock feed is not •grown in the country a portion of the country's stock must be lost, and this is loss of capital, not loss of income. Facts must lie looked at squarely in the face. It is no use hiding our faces in the sand and refusing to see facts. The facts are these:

(1) Our farmers have losit one in four of ther effective workers and' expect the proportions to go to one in three.

(2) They Jiave been compelled as a consequence to reduce cultivation, which is the most laborious work on the farm.

■ (3) Reduction in their grain area means loss of income. Reduction in their stock feed area means loss of capital. Loss of income is not so important as loss of capital. Therefore, they maintnin their area in grain. They can do nothing else.

' In discussing tlio matter with" a townsman he said to me: "That is all very well, but the farmers are growing food for stock and they are not growing food for men. They should put men before stock, no matter what happens. " That is not a fair way to put it. Fond for stock is food for men, clothes for men, houses for men, drink for men, pleasures for men. It provides the men, the women, and the children of this country with almost everything they require. Your butter, your cheese, your milk, your moat, all comes directly from stock. All the woollen goods that our mills manufacture come from stock. Almost the whole of this Dominion's exports come from stock, and\it is our exports that pay for our imports. Without exports wo could not import. We import every year about £4.500,000 worth of clothing. What paid for it? Our stock. Wo imported" annually over £4.000,000 of iroa goods. Our stock paid for them. We import every year over £1,100.000 of tea and sugar, and our stock paM for it. Spirits, wine, and tobacco come to as much more, and our stock uaid for that, tflo. Imports of paper, bows, iissl ttetessstqj

como to £850,000, all paid for by stock. In addition to tho lines quoted wo import groceries and other foodstuffs, motor-cars, coal, cliomicals, picture films, and a thousand and one other things to the value of another £10,000,000, and our stock paid for tho lot. We raised a loan of over £10,000,000 within the Dominion last year to pay our war expenditure, and will probably raise as much more this year. Without our stock wo could not do it. I tell' you that if you want to bring disaster on this country then bring about conditions that will interfere with our supply of stock food.

1 Farmers Have Done Magnificently,

Anyone who looks closely into the facts can arrive at no other conclusion than that our farmers have done magnificently. They have lost one in four of their effective male workerSg and in spite of this they have maintained our agricultural exports in volume as weir as in value. The only thing they have fallen a little behind in is grain, and in response to the appeal recently made to them by the Minister of Agriculture they are putting their shoulder to the wheel and trying to remedy this. I tell you there is no "go slow" policy about tho farmers. If we all buck up as they are doing tho country will be all right. You will think I am talking a lot about the farmers, but they have been misrepresented and abused up and down the country, and I thought I would like to put things in their true light.

In reply to a question at a meeting of farmers m Mastorton on Saturday tho Commissioner of Taxes stated that tho expenses connected with the running and upkeep of a motor-ear used exclusively' in conjunction with a farm wore allowed in making returns for tho excess profits tax. Mr. Clark held that motor-cars were essential to convey farmers to and from their markets. "Of course," said tho Commissioner, '" 'if a farmer takes a ploasure trip in Lis car such expenses cannot bo allowed."

"There must be clear evidence of a partnership agrooment," said the Commissioner of. Taxes in Mastorton on Saturday, "before wages, to a wife are deductahle for excess profits purposes. Tho same thing applies to familios. Unless a stipulated wago is fixed arid actually paid it is not allowable." It was stated by Mr. Hugh Morrison a.'i Saturday's mooting of iho Mastorton branch of the Farmers' Union that the trustees of the Efficiency Board intend-

Ed sending out noticos to farmers almost immediately with tho object of securing some estimate of the man power availablo in the district for farm work. He <mjomed'.fanners to fill in and return these notices as quiokly as possible so. that labour could be organised by tho Efficiency Board.