NATIONAL SHOW

Northern Advocate, 10 November 1934, Page 11

NATIONAL SHOW

LORD BLEDISLOE’S ADDRESS. CONTACT WITH BRITAIN. ADJUSTMENTS IN CONDITIONS. [Per Press Association. — Copyright,] CHRISTCURCH, This Day. The Governor-General, Lord Bledisloe, in his address to a luncheon given in his honour at the Metropolitan Show yesterday, emphasised that New Zealand farmers should endeavour to maintain friendly and close contact with the farmers of Britain. He expressed the confident opinion that any difference among farmers in the Empire could soon' be adjusted. “What has the future in store for you?” His Excellency asked, when speaking of the courage and resourcefulness shown by New Zealand farmers' in their recent difficulties. “You have the pick of the Empire territories —Nature’s greatest gift. Your sample of humanity, British and Native, is unsurpassed elsewhere. Your destiny is what you choose to make it, with the help of industry and improved knowledge, with a careful eye to economy, and, above all, with breadth of vision —a quality difficult to exercise in such insular countries as New Zealand and Great Britain. “But there are two friendly contacts 01% links of knowledge and sympathy, which, as your friend and well-wisher, I would urge you to maintain as essential to your lasting welfare. One is contact with your urban population and their reasonable ambitions, and the other Is contact with farmers of the Old Land.

“Whereas the Ottawa agreements tended to emphasise identity of interest between all Empire farmers, outside economic forces have threatened to neutralise them. As these forces abate —and all evidences of abatement are appearing in America and Germany—all pretext for controversy within the happy circle of the British family of nations will, let us hope, subside. Indeed, lam perfectly certain that even under present conditions adjustments can be effected without economic injustice 'to any experienced and enterprising primary producer in Great Britain or New Zealand.” His Excellency added that one reason that he had declined an invitation to prolong his sojourn in New Zealand was his desire, knowing the agricultural conditions of both countries, to take some small part in the task of reconciling those matters.