WHEAT CROP

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLIII, Issue 20671, 9 March 1937, Page 6

WHEAT CROP

EXCESS MOISTURE DRYING MACHINERY TO BE OBTAINED By Telegraph-Ties? association QUEENSTOWN, March 8. This afternoon the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, Minister of Industries and Commerce, and chairman of the Wheat Committee, was met by representatives of the wheat growers from Balfour and district, who wished to express their appreciation of the Government’s plans for the protection and development of the wheat industry. Speaking on behalf of the growers, Mr Hickey told the Minister that they were well satisfied with what was being done for them, and that they considered the price which had been fixed for the present and the coming season was a very satisfactory one. Mr Wraytt, a member of the County Council, supported Mr Hickey’s remarks, and in doing so stated that the only handicap that the wheat growers of Southland were suffering from was the fact that their wheat had been slightly more moist than the wheat grown in the northern areas of the South Island. This slight handicap had in past years resulted in a lack of demand for the Southland prodcct.

In replying, the Minister thanked the deputation for their voluntary approval of his action in regard to the wheat industry and of the price which he was pleased to hear was so satisfactory. He stated that he was getting many letters from competent wheat-growers thanking him for what he had been doing and for the price that had been fixed.

In regard to the difficulty about moisture in the wheat, Mr Sullivan said that he had recently arranged through the Wheat Committee and the Wheat Research Institute for special consideration to be given to this question. The result o£ his instruction was that cables had been sent recently to Great Britain and other countries in an endeavour to obtain plans and specifications of the best types of machinery used for the purpose of drying and conditioning wheat carrying excess moisture. When the investigations had been completed and the best machines were made available, which he hoped would be during the coming year, he felt that it would be possible that a new era would open for wheat-growing in Southland. The Minister expressed pleasure that Mr Hickey had raised this question, because it would certainly stimulate his interest in the experiments that were now being carried out in the matter of procuring suitable drying machinery. “It will help us,” he said, “to solve the problem of getting sufficient wheat grown to meet the total requirements of New Zealand.” From what had been said by Mr Hickey and Mr Wraytt and others he was hopeful that Southland farmers would substantially contribute to a solution of the problem by returning to an industry which had played a very prominent part in the early history of the agricultural life of the province.