VEGETABLE OUTPUT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25428, 8 January 1944, Page 7

VEGETABLE OUTPUT

DOUBLED IN AUSTRALIA (OC.) SYDNEY, Dec. 3. Australia produced 1,000,000 tons of vegetables this year, or double peace-time production. Vegetable canning increased from 20.000,0001 b before the war to more than 112,000,0001 b, and 80,000 tons of vegetables were dehydrated to make 10,000 tons of dried product. These results were achieved in spite of a serious man-power shortage, and accusations of bungling and bureaucratic mismanagement. The main contributing factor to the successful year was the introduction of machinery which revolutionised vegetable-growing. The Government set up in many parts of the country machinery pools for hire of equipment to farmers. , , Some of the machinery is entirely new to Australia. Potato diggers were a .rarity before the war, but now there are large numbers of them to handle this year’s record crop. Garden tractors, inter-row cultivators, seeders, viners which separate and shell peas from the harvested bushes are other machines which have made their appearance on Australian farms. The Minister of Commerce and Agriculture, Mr W. J. Scully, said that the equipment had been built up on a longrange plan for mass production of vegetables. .and vegetable production had ceased to be a haphazard industry. “After the war Australian canned and dried vegetables will be on the table in the hot, drv areas of Australia, in the Pacific Islands, and in parts of the East,” added Mr Scully. “ Our output will be for local and overseas consumption.”