The New Zealand Times. TUESDAY, JULY 8, 1924. LOOKING FORWARD

New Zealand Times, Volume LI, Issue 11875, 8 July 1924, Page 6

The New Zealand Times. TUESDAY, JULY 8, 1924. LOOKING FORWARD

If there is one thing which, more than any other, can force ue to look forward, it is the Winter Exhibition which we are all enjoying so keenly. That it is a great exhibition is the subject of general agreement. Much is said, always on the occasion of such exhibitions of the shows made in other cities. But there is no need for indulging in the habit of comparison. It is a had habit, because it dwarfs the public intelligence by diverting it from main issues to petty rivalries, and substitutes for the broad outlook in which progress lies, the narfow view which sees only the pettifogging details of : local interest. Ifc is enough to say that this exhibition is, in the matter of the secondary industries of the Dominion, worthy of the capital city of the Dominion. .Moreover, all exhibitions of this kind have their respective places in a great scheme of patriotism, each working its best for the general good, like the members of an eight-oar crew, with each of whom the main interest is the boat’s, while the main effort of each individual oarsman is to pull his weight from beginning to end. During this exhibition, therefore, we must regard it as one of many, pulling all together, not for the glorification 1 of one but for the benefit of all.

Comparison wan unavoidable in re-, spect of the live stock shown. lTor which reason many think it a mistake to have attempted to show live stock. According to this contention, it is impossible ever to get a live stock display in Wellington that will compare favourably with any of the great country shows. On the other hand, it is, these people think, equally impossible for any country show to do justice to the secondary industries, for the simple reason that the .country is not concerned with these. It 'is true that the interests of town and country are together—that is only another way of saying that between them they make New Zealand. But it is equally true that their works lie apart—the country’s being primary production and the town’s secondary production; and each can best present the things of its speciality. There is much in this reasoning. It has the strength of the old proverb about the shoemaker sticking to his last. It is certainly difficult to imagine city magnates knowing about flocks and herds and the assembling of them for the public delectation;'as difficult as to realise that the men of the farm can understand the complexities and delicacies and difficulties of the manufacturing world. The man who can guess the weight of a prize animal to half a pound is naturally, without inspiration in front of a revolving screw. Hence the remarks of some of the speakers on Saturday might let ue know that the live stock department, fairly good as it is, leaves something to be desired by the man from the country. Of course, if there must be live stock at a town winter exhibition, there must be a beginning, and this beginning, like all beginnings, is not of the first rank. But if there were no live stook in the show, the public attention would be concentrated on the secondary industries. And, after all, these town shows are shows of the secondary industries, which are products of the towns. .

The importance of the secondary industries has been regarded from their beginning in this country as secondary. A fitting classification, most people are content to say. But things have been very recently said in public—in Parliament and in this Exhibition—which challenge strongly that classification. Mr Veitch, during the debate on the Address, reviewed the secondary, and the Hon. Downie Stewart and other speakers at the supper on Saturday night each' quoted figures which threw a startling light on the progress of the secondary industries of the Dominion. Here the average citizen finds himself in the presenc- of a great body of manufacturing industry, employing many thousands of hands, distributing hundreds of thousands of pounds in wages, in establishments which have cost many millions of money, putting forth an aggregate output of between 69 and 73 millions sterling value. What startles in the statement is that the output of the

secondary industries is greater in value than the exports of the primary industries; greater by something in the vicinity of ten millions sterling. When the public recovers from the shock of this information it will reflect seriously, and the outcome of its reflections will be a strong wonder why the controllers of the greatest of these secondary industries of ours do not reach out powerfully towards the markets of the world. This exhibition proclaims the quality of the goods of New Zealand manufacture, to be good enough to compete successfully in any market anywhere against all possible competitors. Now, the fact is that there is at the present moment but a faint belief in a few quarters in the possibility of competing in the world’s markets with our manufactures. The exhibition should rouse all and sundry to determine that lit is time to turn over a new leaf in; Ithe New Zealand hook of economic and commerce consideration. These goods are good enough for anybody, and better than similar goods made by competitors who possess the world’s markets. They ought to he exported to the ends of the earth. Why are they not?