RETURN TO PROSPERITY.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIV, Issue 170, 19 June 1934, Page 2

RETURN TO PROSPERITY.

FACTORS IN DOMINIOIN. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, June 19. In his address as retiring president of the Royal Agricultural Society today, Mr R. L. C. MacFarlane said that for many this last year has been the best since 1914. An improvement had been seen in the quantity and quality of production,“and in the high working profits which had enabled most of the losses of the past four years to be paid off. One of the reasons for the improvement was that tlie Government had refused to be stampeded into doing rash things, but had steadily considered the general interests of the one industry upon which the Dominion relied. Other factors were the depreciation of New Zealand’s currency in line with the action taken by the rest of the world, increased prices obtainable overseas owing to natural reaction to the low prices of the previous year, lower costs of production, and more economical methods of management of land to a greater extent than ever before by men of practical experience, also the absence of speculation in farm property. He predicted that, when eomi-Hnce in land reurned fully, the business world would be “falling over itself” to get money into primary production at any sort of low interest. It was the duty of every farmer to maintain and increase that confidence. There was another and greater reason for the returning prosperity—the spirit of the farmers themselves. It was their determination to make their farms pay and increase production in spite of cl;ccouraging prices.