FARMING OUTLOOK

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22404, 28 April 1936, Page 16

FARMING OUTLOOK

NEED FOR CHEAP FOOD DANGER OF SUBSTITUTES UNPOPULARITY OF QUOTAS "In England 93 per cent of the people are vitally interested in cheap foods, a fact which makes it difficult for politicians to get support from the masses for any move to impose quotas," said Mr. C. H. Holford, in giving an address on the future of agriculture at the weekly luncheon of the Rotary Club at Milne and Chovce's Reception Hall yesterday. The president, Mr. J. P. O'Connor, presided. The most hopeful sign in the marketing situation to-day, Mr. Holford considered, was the trend in Europe away from quotas. Although great strides had been made in Britain in recent years, that country was still able to grow enough food only for its week-ends and must look to the rest of the world to produce the essentials for the other days. "The greatest singlo step toward civilisation," said Mr. Holford, in reviewing the history of agriculture, "was when man found that he could raise plants from seed and so grow his food in the one place. This was probably only some 8000 years ago in tho valley of the Nile, and marked the beginning of towns. Since then, in spite of all the development that has gone on, fully 70 per cent of the world's population today is still directly dependent for its existence on the success of agriculture." Future o! "White Races At present the great cloud over the future of agriculture was the recognised tendency to the decline of the white races, continued Mr. Holford. It had been estimated that the population of Britain would have declined to 33,000,000 by 1976, and at the same rate in 200 years' time there would be only 6,000,000 people. Since agriculture, unlike other industries, depended entirely on the power of people to buy and consume good food, this must be regarded as a most serious state of affairs.

"The problem is further intensified by the grouping of people into at least 60 great nations." said Mr. Holford. "Before the war there was a period of rising prices, giving a great fillip to ■world agriculture. Afterwards, there had to be a great readjustment, due to the rise of tho primitive tribal instinct that gave an impetus to a pernicious nationalism, causing a shrinkage of world trade to one-third of its former volume." Unfavourable Trends The seriousness of the question of over-production and under-consump-tion had been fully recognised by the leading powers, and it was significant that the League of Nations had spent three days recently on this problem alone. Still more significant was their finding that it was better to subsidise consumption rather than to restrict production. The recent report on nutrition by Sir John Orr had pointed out that as many as 4,500,000 people in Britain spent an average of only 4s a week on food, while a further 9,000,000 averaged only 9s. There were a number of unfavourable trends, stated Mr. Holford, Generally people sought lighter foods and clothing the result of a machine age, of less exercise, of living indoors and of medical advice. On the other side research was making for increased production, with the growing of the important crops to the extreme limit of their range and the unnatural increase in the yield of animal products. The machine was playing its part, bringing in country quickly with amazing new implements. Irrigation, the use of which had been known since the early days, was enabling the richer soils of the arid regions to attain their maximum productivity.

The whole situation was further complicated by the great rise of synthetic and other substitutes. Whale oil turned into margarine was becoming a competitor against butter, the manufacture of rayon had increased twentyfold in recent years, and artificial wool had not yet been removed from the horizon. Against this there were signs of farm produce making some gain in the battle, one of the most interesting being the production of motor parts on a large scale from soyabeans in the United States. Against these adverse influences man must bring to bear the weight of all possible help from soil surveys, farm management research and the development of greater allround efficiency. The Importanec of Grass It was less than a century since the advent of artificial fertilisers, Mr. Holford continued. As recently ns 1898, Sir William Crookes had predicted a world shortage of wheat in 1930, tho result of the exhaustion of the stocks of Chilean nitrates. Yet that particular year saw the greatest surplus of wheat the world had ever known. Sir William had qualified his prediction by a statement that the only salvation would be man's discovery of a method of extracting nitrogen from the air. To-day that had been accomplished and there seemed no danger of potash shortage. More serious to-day was the prospect of a shortage of phosphates, which nature had stored up in odd places mostly of a marine character. "In New Zealand, farming will have to go if we ever run out of phosphates," Mr. Holford remarked. "Grass still, after all the centuries, remains the greatest living thing," Mr. Holford concluded. "No scientist has been able to reproduce it. Unob--Btrusively it takes its food from the air and the soil, and builds up in its young leaves the nutritive equivalent of milk. If grass were destroyed overnight, mankind would follow it within a short time. To New Zealand it represents the basis of life, and one can truly say that our life's blood is green and not rod."