NEW ZEALAND’S ILLS

Dominion, Volume 23, Issue 221, 14 June 1930, Page 10

NEW ZEALAND’S ILLS

Grass the Salvation WELL-EQUIPPED COUNTRY The opinion that New- Zealand’s economic problems are not insoluble was expressed by the Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, at the civic reception to him at Wanganui. The speaker remarked that the country was well equipped to face its problems. His Excellency said he was at present a learner, and -spoke with diffidence as vet on particular local problems and difficulties. When he had learned more, he would like to help. There were many big problems common to all countries of the world. Prominent among them were periodical trade depression and unemployment. He was convinced, howeyer, that they were not insoluble, at least in a country like this, of largely undeveloped natural resources, with an unrivalled climate for plant growth, and a relatively small population of hard-working, courageous people, progressively alive to the teachings of science and not blind to modern economic forces. Physically, socially, educationally, and, might he add, spiritually, New Zealand was well equipped for the tasks awaiting her. Those countries would most confidently face the future whose people would (for the time at least) unselfishly co-operate to work out their own salvation —who, in politics, industry, and religion, would seek for points of contact rather than points of difference. Look to the Fields. In spite of the distance from markets and the impracticability of rapidly establishing big factories in these days of competitive mass production, there need be no anxiety about chronic and continuous unemployment in* a country whose primary production offered such big potentialities as New Zealand, always assuming that the land output was _of high uniform quality and that marketing for export was rigidly organised and controlled, preferably by the producers themselves. If he might be pardoned for altering a Biblical quotation, he would say. “New Zealanders, lift up your eyes not only to your sheep-covered hills, but to your grass paddocks from whence cometh your future economic salvation. ’ His Excellency added that in New Zealand there was 50 per cent, more population in the towns than in .the countryside. The more relatively that urban population increased and the rural population shrank, the more unstable would the economic position of New Zealand become. They should use every effort to stop the drift to towns and make country life more attractive. The solution to the problem should not be left to the Government only.