MAIZE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 7, Issue 17, 22 October 1943, Page 4

MAIZE

WHEN a responsible officer of the Internal Marketing Department openly informs a meeting of maize growers, that he is fully aware of the fact that his offer of a six-penny subsidy will be unacceptable to them, there is surely something amiss with the authority which is putting such an offer forward. With one breath the Government through its representative appeals to the farmers to grow more maize as a war effort—the parrot-cry of which growers have become heartily sick during the past three years, and in the next it is admitted that it is more or less conversant with the fact that its offer will not be accepted. This sort of shuffling has directly lead in the past to the stifling of what was once a profitable industry in the Eastern Bay of Plenty, where three years ago some 5000 acres of maize were planted. To-day farmers are definite in their stand that unless a fairer basis of subsidy is forthcoming as shown on their own figures the whole industry will be permitted to die a natural death. From the temper of speakers at least week's conference this appears, about to eventuate.