The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday Morning. Thursday, November 22, 1888. DAIR FARMING.

Gisborne Standard and Cook County Gazette, Volume II, Issue 225, 22 November 1888, Page 2

The Gisborne Standard AND COOK COUNTY GAZETTE Published every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday Morning.

Thursday, November 22, 1888. DAIR FARMING.

Be just and fear not; Let all the ends thou aim’st at be thy country’s, Thy God’s, and truth’s.

The subjoined extract is from a Wellington paper of last week, and there is contained in it much that can well be reflected upon by every settler in this district:— The Hon. the Minister for lands was interviewed this morning by Mr W. D. Grant., dairy produce expert and merchant, late of New York, but now of the firm of Boyd and Grant, Loudon, England, who is travelling through this country, as we previously announced, for the purpose of opening up an export dairy produce trade with his firm in the English metropolis. Mr Grant has met with an unexpected difficulty in the shape of the Australian drought, which has caused nearly all the New Zealand dairy produce output to be bespoke in that direction for this year, but, of course, thia is only a temporary check to his enterprise. He asserts, however, that there is a tendency on the part of the factories in this colony to favour the Australian trade before the English. Mr Grant is of the opinion that the dairy farmers of New Zealand are not yet able to make the best of the at their disposal. The conditions of the colony as regards its dairy produce development now is akin to what that of Canada was some twenty years ago. The Canadian system is now reckoned as one of the most perfect in the world, but that was only attained by State aid in the matter of technical education on the subject. The great drawback to New Zealand, however, says Mr Grant, is the persistent manner in which one part of the colony will play itself off at the expense of all the rest of the country, and the wholesale depreciation by New Zealanders themselves of the colony generally. If the Americans, he says, were to make a practice of running down that country, as New Zealanders do theirs, it would very soon be nothing but a mudhole, as all the capitalists would leave it. It is Mr Grant’s intention to appoint an agency in the colony for the export trade with his firm, but it does not appear to be settled as yet where the headquarters of the agency will be. It is to be regretted that Mr Grant has not paid this district a visit. For his sake, as well as for that of the settlers, it is a matter for regret, for we feel sure he could not help being pleased with the prospects afforded for utilising for his own purposes a district so favored with climate and soil as this district is. What is wanted is a fair market; if Mr Grant’s firm can offer us this, we have no doubt that he could very soon find a satisfactory response. That gentleman makes some very pointed remarks on the present condition of things, and it must be plain to anyone that the splendid possibilities at our disposal are greatly neglected. The remarks, too, about New Zealanders generally have an especial application to this

district which we are ashamed to admit. But there appears to be a great deal to be gained by Mr Grant’s visit to the colony, and if one of Nature’s most richly endowed districts cannot be a sharer in that gain it will be the fault of those most deeply interested. Some visitors say that our settlers lack energy, and also skill in dairy work. The latter assertion has some truth, but that truth is only what is applicable to the whole of New Zealand—it is evident that our dairy-farmers are behind the age so far as preparation for export is concerned. That the dairy-farmers in our own locality are without energy is not true, but it cannot be denied that that energy is not used to the best advantage. There is an entire absence of any system of mutually benefiting one another. Each one therefore is compelled to sacrifice his or her produce for prices much below what might be otherwise realised, and outside markets are almost unthought of. Had there been anything in the shape of co-opera-tion, we may be certain that a gentleman of Mr Grant’s connections would not be allowed to remain in the colony for any length of time without having his attention directed to the fertile district of Poverty Bay.