FARMERS' UNION CONFERENCE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3247, 7 June 1916, Page 10

FARMERS' UNION CONFERENCE.

The presidential address delivered by Mr James Begg at the Farmery' Union Conference in Dunedin was a lucid and straightforward utterance which will vreii repay attention. The war has not as yet been inimical to the productiveness of this country. Rather it has stimulated it. The past year has been one of unprecedented prosperity on the part of the majority of the farming community. The exports of the Dominion have increased largely in value, the farmers as a class have made many gains as a remit of the war, and the outlook in regard to the immediate future trend of prices is exceedingly good. These things are fully admitted, and no doubt they constitute the chief reason for the charge levelled against the farmers that they are exploiting the needs of the community, since prosperity is resting upon them at a time when prices are abnormally high. Mr Begg took up the cudgels to good effect in defence of the farmer against the cry of exploitation. As if farmers can combine for any purpose whatever! The idea is absurd. His review of the situatiou should lead some impartial-minded, if thoughtless, persons to reconsider their views. If the farmer be not the cause of high prices, the critical may ask, Where does the cause lie? Mr Begg's answer leadsjj him to some interesting observations on the subject of protective duties, and he enunciates the policy of the Farmers' Union. It must appeal to many of the patriots of the Empire. His views may not thoroughly satisfy everybody, and may not offer much consolation for the price of butter; but it is the whole chain of reasoning that counts. It would be no great satisfaction to the community to pay less for certain articles of consumption and be as a whole less well off than it is at present. Yet such is the effect that restriction of exports would tend to produce. Restriction of exports—which, Mr Begg argues, would be the result of the imposition of export duties, a policv favoured by a good many people—would tend to discourage Production, the great source of the wealth of the Dominion as a whole, and scarcity of production is itself a great factor in causing high pTices. High prices have, of course, the effect of increasing production, and there can be no doubt that the greater the impetus production in New Zealand can receive the better it will be for the people of the Dominion, and the more substantial will be the assistance they can render the Old Country in this hour of crisis. The ridicule cast by the retiring president upon the idea that the cost of living is to be reduced through the adoption of an expedient which would, as he contends, tend to bring about decreased production, is based on arguments which will appeal to the majority of people as sound and practical, and not less so because he offers on behalf of the farmers as a class an assurance that they are quite willing to pay their full share of taxation, and that they would prefer, and it would be to the interests of the whole community, that they should be taxed to the uttermost farthing rather than, that the stimulus to production should be withdrawn.