LESS SHEEP

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 17, 20 July 1921, Page 6

LESS SHEEP

HEAVY DECLINE SHOWN

MINISTER'S APPEAL TO FARMERS.

Attention to the steady decrease in the number of sheep in the' Dominion was drawn by the Minister of Agriculture (the Hon. W. Nosworthy) in opening the annual conference of the New Zealand Council of Agriculture this morning. The dairying industry, he said, was going ahead, but there was, he was sorry to say, a very considerable drop in the number of sheep. The last published figures showed that this drop had been in the vicinity of two millions, while again this year, as shown by the advance proofs of the returns shortly to be published, there would be, he was afraid, a drop of between 600,000' and 700.000 sheep.

Why there should be this falling off it was hard to say, and he did hope that the farmers would nob continue the pre-sent-policy of letting their sheep stocks decline. He believed that, although the sheepfarmcrs were passing through a very serious crisis, the prospects were probably brighter than had ever been known before. Sheep stocks had been declining generally, and the result would be that wool and mutton, especially the class of mutton and wool produced in New Zealand, would once more be in .active demand, and New Zealand's position would naturally be improved. With tho return to normal conditions—Germany at work, the British strike at an end, the. recognition of the people that their one- salvation was work—he was looking forward to things righting themselves a great deal sooner that some people would lead others to believe.