RURAL CREDITS.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 December 1932, Page 6

RURAL CREDITS.

The annual meeting of the North Taranaki Co-operative Rural Intermediate Credit Association, Ltd., indicated that the association had come through a very difficult year successfully. A loss of less than £2 is a tribute to the prudence with which advances have been recommended and to the manner in which settlers obtaining assistance have done their best to meet their liabilities. It is not surprising that some little disappointment was expressed at the limitations imposed upon such associations. When they were set up it was hoped that by the assistance they afforded production would increase and enable liabilities to the board to be wiped out and some reserve funds accumulated from which it might be possible to give the widest possible interpretations of the power to grant assistance. The low prices ruling have made such a result impossible and have made it necessary to scrutinise very carefully any applications for assistance. It was never intended that rural credits should be another form of charitable aid. They were intended to permit the inclusion in the assets of a settler of his personal qualities and knowledge of husbandry. In many cases these qualifications were considered sufficient to warrant credit being given, and from the point of view of production the advances have been generally justified. The financial results have not been so satisfactory, due, of course, to the lower prices ruling for primary products. As the Rural Credits Board is working upon money invested by the State and private deben-ture-holders it is obvious that its first duty must be to conserve its resources and safeguard the funds with which it has been entrusted. It is quite true that this means strict limitation of its powers to make advances to genuine settlers who have no assets but personality and knowledge. It is a position for which neither the local associations nor the Credits Board are responsible. It is a problem that is bound up in the larger question of land settlement, a problem which is one for the Legislature to deal with. /