PASTURE LANDS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 19569, 16 August 1933, Page 4

PASTURE LANDS

MANAGEMENT AND UTILISATION CONFERENCE OF EXPERTS By Telegraph—Press Association CHRISTCHURCH, August 15. Experts in pasture farming from all parts of the Dominion met to-day at the first annual Conference of the New Zealand Grasslands' Association. Dr. E. Marsden presided, in the absence, through illness of the president, Mr A. H. Cockayne, whose address was broadcast from his bed in Wellington to members in the conference room. The delegates were welcomed by Dr. James Hight, rector of Canterbury College, who emphasised the importance of maintaining the productivity of Dominion lands. Dr. Marsden then addressed the delegates. Importance of Pastures. Dr. Marsden said that they met at the conference as students and equals to learn from one another that which would enrich their own minds and enable them to serve the public better in their various positions as scientific workers, teachers, administrators and business men. ‘We are here to discuss the main question at the root of all New Zealand's pastoral production,” he continued. “That is, the provision, management, and utilisation of our grasslands, for it is probably true that In no other country does the clothing of the pastures play such a large and direct part in the nutrition of those animals which convert the herbage into human food and into wool for export. We are Justly proud in New Zealand of the standard of general knowledge of grasslands. We realise the Dominion’s advantages In this direction, and, we are here to discuss the means by which our knowledge may be increased, and how our natural advantages may be exploited to as full an extent as possible, because we know that therein lies the possibility of economic production in competition in world markets.

Sooner or later the present wave of economic nationalism and self-suffi-ciency throughout the world must prove to be against the best interests of all countries. Apart from the absolute necessities of economic production in the present, we need to be ready for the time when increased world’s markets are available, to take as large a share of these markets as possible; and the fundamental question involved is to obtain through our grasslands the maximum amount of production possible compared with expenditure involved; that is, we need to find those conditions of management of our grasslands which will give us the optimum return.

“If our farmers and our country are to prosper, agriculture must be made a business, and a profitable business. Of all Industries, however, agriculture has the greatest number of complicating factors, both In practice and from the scientific point of view.” Dr. Marsden added that in the study of agriculture as a whole, it was probably well to concentrate on the study of Its various parts and with the enthusiasm which came alone from such specialised study. The particular study for this conference was the Important one of grasslands, and the presence of so many and well-known representatives of producers, merchants, and technical services demonstrated the

way of true 00-operatlon—scientific cooperation for the search of facts and truth.