HOME ECONOMICS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3996, 14 October 1930, Page 9

HOME ECONOMICS.

OTAGO ASSOCIATION. The annual meeting of the Otago Home Economics Association was held in the Home Science Building. Otago University, last week. Professor Strong occupied the chair. There was a large attendance. The annual report showed that the association had made good progress during the season, and the balance sheet dieclosed a credit of £177 14s 6d.

Professor Strcng. in the course of a brief address, stated that the association had been in existence for 10 years, during which it had made tremendous growth. Its aims were very practical, and it etood for ideal homelife, unhampered by traditions of the past, and the utilisation of all the resources of modern science to improve home life. The association believed that the homemaker had more power over and more responsibility for improving the health and increasing the happiness of the community than anyone else could have, but in order to meet these responsibilities she needed to ,be kept in touch with the newest scientific discoveries and their application to everyday life. New Zealand had established an enviable record for its low rate of infant mortality, and the Plunket Society was doing a splendid work for infanta and young children. It gave advice to mothers and prospective mothers’ also; but training for motherhood must be begun in the early years of a.young woman’s life. A newspaper report of the Minister of Health in England on the problem of maternal mortality had recently been published. According to the findings of the committee investigating the causes of 2000 maternal deaths, not less than half had been preventable. Various causes were assigned; but in 52 per cent, of the deaths no preventable factor had been discovered. _ One was inclined to ask whether the inability of women to meet this crisis might not be partly’ due to lowered vitality; the result of wrong habits of living and to overwork or working under wrong conditions. The Government had undertaken an enormous task in establishing dental clinics and staffing them with a body of trained workers to deal with the care and treatment of children's teeth, while it was well recognised that this trouble anti-dated the school period. The dental climes might save some of the teeth of the young people; but the diet of their mothers before the children were born determined the Quality of those teeth.

Goitre was a New Zealand'bugbear, and diet was an important factor in its prevention as well as that of rickets. Indeed, prevention was the watchward in home economics. Why were men and women so apathetic over the prevalence of disease? Why did they not devote their energies to stamping it out? If loss of iife could be lessened and working power increased by the effort of men and women, why did they not make that effort? For no other reason than their disbelief in the teachings of science, coupled with a lingering superstition that, after all. it was fate, not will power, which ruled the destinies of mankind. The Home Eceonomics Association had been working for the past 10 years to bring about an understanding of right living conditions, comprising pure food, safe water, clean and disease-free atmosphere in which to live and work, proper housing, and the adjustment of work, rent and amusement. As a result of the efforts of the Home Economies Association in carrying interest and information to the home-makers in and around Dunedin, the Carnegie Corporation had given its donation to Otago University- for furthering adult education for women in home science and arts. Only by organisation could this be effected, and the country women were actively engaged in forming branches of their association for the purpose of bettering conditions of living and improving the health and increasing the happiness and welfare of the family. Fifty of sixty study groups had been formed in the course of one year’s efforts ; on the part of three young people, and they had earned their salaries. The past year had been one of the best that the association had ever had, but a still greater effort had yet to be made. The association should organise women in the various towns. It had a big mission to : perform, and the branches should do all they could to swell the funds, of the central council. It would like to send two agents out to organise women throughout the Dominion. She knew of no’ other organsiation with the same aims. The following office-bearers were elected: —President. Professor Strong.; ■ vice-presidents, Mesdames Cameron, Nimmo. and Leary; councillors—Mesdames Park, Evans, M'Kenzie, and J M'Millan; secretary. Miss Stevenson; treasurer, Airs Aikman.

It was decided to postpone the election of further councillors until a conference of women’s organisations had been held. Reports were received from each of the branches