AN URGENT NEED

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 67, 24 April 1945, Page 5

AN URGENT NEED

VETERINARY SCIENCE CHAIR

BUSINESSMEN SPONSOR MEETING

Wholehearted support for a suggestion from the Tauranga Chamber of Commerce that a 'chair' for Veterinary Science training in our New Zealand ■ Universities was voiced by speakers at the meeting of the Whakatane Chamber of Commerce last Thursday, when it was unanimously decided to convene a meeting of organisations , representative of farming interests to take the matter further. Speaking to the letter the chairman Mr H. Warren said that it was 5 9 a surprise to him to learn that in all our Agricultural institutions, that the Dominion did not possess the means of training veterinarians. In a country such as ours where the main industries were based upon farm production it seemed wrong to have to send our young men elsewhere to be trained in this work. The Tauranga letter emphasised the need to ftain young New Zealanders in the midst of New Zealand conditions ? as one means of overcoming the immense stock losses incurred annually. Mr W. Sullivan was in. strong support, pointing out that in the whole of New Zealand lie under-, stood that there was only something like 26 veterinarians,, and although we had established splendid centres such as Mas&ey College it was astonishing to think that our future 'vets' had to be sent to Australia to be trained. Mr J. Crecke suggested that in order to lend weight to the scheme it would be well to invite farming organisations to attend a meeting for that purpose. On the motion of the chairman it was decided to convene such meeting in the near future and toi invite representatives of the dairy companies, the Herd Testing Association Primary Production Council, Pig Council and the Farmers' Union with the idea of making joint representations to the Minister of Agriculture.