The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1907. A NEGLECTED INDUSTRY.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLI, Issue 226, 24 September 1907, Page 4

The Marlborough Express PUBLISHED EVERY EVENING. TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1907. A NEGLECTED INDUSTRY.

Fruit-growing may be regarded as a neglected industry in New Zealand. Some districts certainly go in for it on a fairly large scale, but, taken as a whole, the Dominion by no means realises its possibilities in this direction. Yet no country in the world is better adapted for fruit culture, climate and soil being alike highly favourable to the full development of so important and profitable an industry. We have the example of other countries to show the possibilities of the business. The little State of Tasmania has for many years been regarded as practically the home of the apple in Australasia, the southern portion alone sending many thousands of cases to the English market every season. Victoria has also been travelling along the same lines for some years past, and New South Wales and South Australia are developing the industry. In California "fruit is king," the up-to-date methods in vogue there attracting the attention of the whole fruit-growing world. In none of these countries, excepting Tasmania, is the climate so well adapted to fruit culture as the Middle Island of New Zealand, with its even temperature and its absence of droughts. Yet we lag behind in what should be an important method of wealth production, enabling land now lying idle to be turned to profitable account, and giving employmen to large numbers of people. It is not merely the growing of the fruit to which attention requires to be directed. That is only one stage in the wealth-producing process. What to do with it when it is grown also requires attention, in fact is the crux of the whole matter. Fruit is grown now in a desultory fashion, the difficulty in finding a market for it being one of the greatest hindrances to its full development. Jam and canning factories require to go hand in hand with the growing process, and then the industry would flourish. In Hastings the Frimley factory disposes profitably of all the fruit grown in the neighbourhood, and encourages the fruit-growers to increase their output. As more fruit is grown the factory is I increased to enable it to be dealt with, and so the process goes on, one assist^ ing the other, and both creating more wealth, and providing still further em-' ployment. A factory in or near Blen-: heim would prove a wonderful incentive to the fruit-grower. Every small patch, containing but a few trees would toe brought into profitable account, and in course of time large London liners would come to Picton every season to take away our shipments to the Old World markets. This has been done in Tasmania for years past now. And why not in Marlborough ?