Haphazard Research.

Thames Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 19622, 1 February 1936, Page 3

Haphazard Research.

WHERE NEW ZEALAND LAGS.

SCIENTIFIC GUIDANCE,

PROFESSOR WORLEY’S VIEWS

(Special to “Star.”)

DUNEDIN, Feb. 1

In his presidential address to the Ncav Zealand Institute of Chemistry, Professor F. P. Worley, professor of chemistry at the Auckland University College, made charges of tardiness in the application of chemistry to agriculture and industry in NeAV Zealand, and of lack of organised and concentrated research.

City councils have yet to learn the value, of efficient scientific guidance. No private company operating on the scale of the larger municipal councils could afford to be without an efficiently staffed laboratory controlling by analysis and tests the large purchases of material, supervising scientifically such operations as water purification, sewage treatment and road formation, and dealing with the corrosion and choking of mains, the utilsiation of waste products from municipal abattoirs, and the use of fuels, and other problems.

“Research in all its branches in New Zealand has been, and still is, large haphazard,” said Professor Worley. “The chemical researches carried out at the university colleges, although frequently of considerable merit, are in the main research exercises carried out by candidates for the master of science degree. Through lack of adequate staffing and finance it has been impossible for colleges to undertake systematic investigation of the larger problems connected with the development of our natural resources.”

Countries of greater enlightenment had no hesitation in devoting to research amounts commensurate with the magnitude of the problem and profits likely to accrue.