THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 303, 18 September 1936, Page 8

THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

The Minister of Agriculture, in a foreword to.the annual report of his department which was presented in Parliament yesterday, refers to the department’s relations with farmers. Activity must be based increasingly, he says, on instruction instead of regulation —“essential regulation must represent_ the result of instruction”—and his officers henceforward must function more and more as instructors rather than as inspectors. There is certainly more virtue in telling a tpan why he should do this, and why he should not do that, than in pouncing upon him for not doing this, and doing that. The Minister’s idea that his department should function as an educational institution is quite sound. There is ample evidence that it has functioned very well in that way in the past, but it may be admitted, in view of the increasing competition in the overseas markets against our farm products, that the need for stressing the importance of quality, and showing the farmers how to obtain it, has become imperative. In this respect both the farmers and the department’s officers should regard themselves as playing in a. team, striving for top score in quality. Mr. Martin says the quality of one of our products depends on the quality of others. That is obviously true. Many factors come into the question—good fertiliser, good grass, good stock, and so on. Perfection of quality is the sum o( proper ingredients.