SUPPLY OF PHOSPHATE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20058, 22 September 1928, Page 12

SUPPLY OF PHOSPHATE.

THE NAURU AGREEMENT. NEED OF REVISION URGED. [by telegraph.—OWN CORRESPONDENT. 1 WANGANUI. Friday. "At the risk of being considered an alarmist, I say that the position at present is by no means assured or comfortable,' said Mr L. J Wild, director of the Masscy Agricultural College, when speaking to .farmers here on New Zealand s existing arrangement for supplies of Nauru phosphate. Mr. Wild said that the Nauru agreement" was made after the war, and stipulated New Zealand's share of the output at 16 per cent. At present the Dominion was taking and using 25 per cent, of the Nauru output, and that was only made possible by the fact that Great Britain did not require her 42 per cent. Mr. Wild urged that a revision of the existing agreement was necessary The Minister of Agriculture had said there was no need to worry for the next ten years, but in the Agricultural Journal of last January the commissioner for the New Zealand supply had said that during the next three years the demand would be from 100,000 tons to 200.000 tons greater than the supply. New Zealand was now getting her phosphate from other sources as well as Nauru For tho first quarter of tlio present year the Dominion had obtained 9000 tons from Nauru and 13,389 tons from Morocco. When the Nauru equipment attained its greatest efficiency the annual output would bo 1.000,000 tons New Zealand's quota of 16 per cent, would be 160,000 tons, hut the Dominion was already using 200,000 tons a year.