VALUE OF A. & P. SHOWS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 3, Issue 275, 24 February 1941, Page 4

VALUE OF A. & P. SHOWS

ALL honour to the Agricultural and Pastoral Society for producing the goods last Wednesday. Town and district echoes the general ohorus of commendation, yet in spite of having the pluck and determination to carry on the Society was performing an important national service. This may seem to be exaggerating the position, but a little analysis will prove it to. be beyond dispute. The Show making, as it cbes for the production of better, finer types of stock dairy and beef cattle, of heavier baconers and porkers and improved sheep breeds is doing much to lift the standard of production. In the protected conditions furnished in. the Dominion, this is possible' to a degree, which less fortunate countries csn never hope to attain. The war conditions in Europe have depleted the bloodstock in the older settled countries, and even in Jersey Island itself, the latest cables tell of the wholesale plundering of the pedigree herds for replenishing the German dairy stock. Yet the war has scarcely started. What will be the position in five, or maybe ten years. The Continental stock producers will have practically gone out of business owing to the growing demands of the voracious war machine invented and engineered by the Nazis. The Danish and Dutch farm lands have alike been depleted by the merciless hand of the aggressor. Ordered investigation and careful scientific breeding of stronger and better stock have gone by the. board. The starving millions under the Swastika cry aloud for sustenance, yet the choicest foods of the conquered lands are reserved for the victors and no others. New Zealand. Australia, and the American States will have a duty to perform after this ghastly business is over, and that duty will be the re-stocking of the herds of the continent of Europe and of Britain. This as time goes on and the struggle grows more .desperate, will bjjome a sa,cred trusti which must never be overlooked, else dairying in its highest sense will become a lost art. We alone in lands undisturbed by the war are capable of saving this great and vital industry for the benefit of mankind, and for this alone., must see to it that we foster well, and encourage the Agricultural exhibitions, which annually are promoted by those public-minded bodies of men known as show committees.