TE AWAMUTU COURIER Printed on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays WEDNESDAY, 5th NOVEMBER, 1947 HAMPERING DEVELOPMENT

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 75, Issue 6442, 5 November 1947, Page 6

TE AWAMUTU COURIER Printed on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays WEDNESDAY, 5th NOVEMBER, 1947 HAMPERING DEVELOPMENT

THE immediate effect of the subsidy withdrawal from fertilisers on hill country and marginal lands of New Zealand can be readily foreseen, but in the long-range planning the handicap imposed to-day is difficult to estimate. The New Zealand Grasslands Association last week made a further endeavour to caution the Government about the seriousness and the retarding influences surrounding its present policy, and very certainly farmers everywhere will sense the folly of the Government’s action. The director of the Grasslands Division of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research was positive in his warnings. “ The cost of applying superphosphate to hill country,” he said, “ is so high that relative added revenue is insufficient to warrant its use. Such prohibition is a national disaster, and is certain to lead to serious long-term deterioration of what could be one of New Zealand’s greatest national assets.” With his subsequent reasoning no one will raise a question, for his estimate of millions of acres of marginal land that will revert to flat weeds, poor grasses, and finally to manuka, unless a stock-carrying capacity of four ewes plus cattle can be maintained is unquestionably right. He was right, also, when he claimed that “ phosphate, lime, and clovers are the basis of our national wealth.” That statement has been proven through the years. During the war and the period of rationing the deterioration of hill and marginal lands was recognised everywhere as a serious war-time economic difficulty, and a general wish was expressed for restoration of supply to overtake the handicap of the war years. But, when availability of supply makes possible a better economic condition the Government deliberately makes uneconomic the treatment of these lands and endangers the future economy of the Dominion. Fortunately, the Grasslands Association is on the alert, and has very properly called the attention of the Government to the seriousness of what is now being done by this withdrawal of subsidy from the sphere of its greatest need and justification. The suggestion made for a classification of lands, and that fertiliser committees be set up to assess the measure of rebate on fertilisers bought and freight paid, is a worthy one. Assistance can and must be forthcoming for what is developmental if New Zealand is to hope for a continuing increase in production from these lands. The alternative will be a slipping back of what has so far been done and further deterioration of the land% in question. Public inquiries have been conducted and public expenditure incurred in less worthy directions. Just as certainly, if the ruling economy of our country is to endure, the volume and extent of production must be expanded; and where, except to the marginal lands, can the Government turn for expanding settlement and production ? In short, if the Government systematically endeavoured to destroy much that now exists in the nation’s economy, it could not succeed better than in this defect of marginal land settlement. In any case, the Grasslands Association is well advised in its statement of the case, and the Government will be wise if it heeds the warning; but it will be wiser still if it takes the necessary action while there is yet time, to’avert a serious disaster to New Zealand’s farming activities.