ECONOMIC BOTANY

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 83, 6 January 1928, Page 8

ECONOMIC BOTANY

STUDY OF EMPIRE PROBLEMS VISIT OF DR. A. W. HILL Owing to altered steamer arrangements, Dr. A. W. Hill, F.R.S., C.M.G., director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, will now commence his tour of the Dominion this month at Auckland, instead of at Wellington, as originally intended. As a consequence the proposed itinerary will be reversed. Dr. Hill is at present visiting Canberra and Sydney, and his latest communication to the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research states that he will be leaving on Tuesday for Tasmasia, where he will remain until January 17. He will leave Sydney by the Ulimaroa on January 20 for Auckland, where he is due on January 24. The itinerary mapped out for the North Island includes visits to the kauri forest or Rangitoto Island, and the Domain, Auckland;. to the forestry plantations and native forests at Rotorua; to Taupo and National Park; and to the flax swamps and pastoral lands of the Manawatn. While in Wellington Dr. Hill will hold consultations with the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, visit Wainui-o-mata in company with the director of parks and reserves, and be the guest of honour at a reception to be tendered by the New Zealand Institute of Horticulture in the Concert Chamber of the Town Hall, where a special display of New Zealand flowers will be given. In the South Island Dr. Hill is to visit Christchurch, and will inspect the forest services at Hamner and the plantations of the Hon. Sir R. Heatop Rhodes. Other visits include calls at Arthur’s Pass, Hokitika, and Nelson. A walk from Arthur’s Pass to Otira is contemplated. It is doubtful whether time will permit of a visit to Dunedin. -. The occasion is the first on winch a director of the Royal Botanic Guldens has been enabled to travel to the Dominions and the colonies, the departure being made possible by the action of the Empire Marketing Board in making a grant to the Kew authorities to permit them to send abroad from time to time members of their staff to studv- problems of economic botanv. It is the aim of the Empire Marketing Board to make Ke w a central bureau on Bmp-te botanical problenis—an object encouraged by the services that establishment has already rendered to the banana and rubberproducing portions of the Empire. Dr. Hill will be in the Dominion until February 1.3.