TRAINING LADS FOR THE FARM.

Waipa Post, Volume VI, Issue 252, 3 October 1913, Page 4

TRAINING LADS FOR THE FARM.

It is estimated that fully £700,000 a year is spent in Australia on agricultural education and experimental work. New Zealand’s expenditure is a good deal behind this. To cope with the scarcity of labour, New South Wales has made an excellent start with farming schools, where labourers are trained for the service of agriculturists, dairymen, and fruit-growers. The farms are mostly recruited from lads throughout under the assisted passage arrangement from the Old Country; and, though the experiment was only begun a few years ago, 600 lads have passed through one or other of the half dozen farms in the senior State to farms where skilled labour is always in demand and commands a good wage. The cost is defrayed from the fund raised by citizens for the purchase of a Dreadnought for the British navy. As the Dreadnought was provided by the Commonwealth Government it was rightly felt that no better use could be found for part at least of the fund than the provision of trained hands for the farms. The farms are conducted at so small a cost as to be almost self-supporting : and, altogether they furnish- a more satisfactory solution of the problem to be solved than would the farm schools it is proposed to establish in the Old Country for the benefit of Australian agriculture. The training is given on the spot under local conditions, so that the lad, in passing to the farm, finds that he has nothing to un-

learn, and can go on at once with his practical education with advantage to his employer and also to his prospects of becoming in turn a landholder when he has acquired enough experience and money to warrant the plunge.