Pig Improvement Organisation

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 25, 27 February 1948, Page 5

Pig Improvement Organisation

Supervisor’s Conference Suggests Alterations After reviewing the results of the past ten years work as it has been organised under the National and District Pig Councils, the Pig Supervisors’ Conference has expressed itself as convinced that a complete reorganisation of pig improvement councils is required. This the conference thought necessary because of the alleged apparent preoccupation of the councils, both district and national, mainly with' questions of pig-meat prices and with politics to the detriment of pig improvement work. The major responsibilities of the councils, the promotion of the pig raising industry and encouragement of the formation of pig clubs had, it was claimed, resolved into the personal and unorganised responsibility of the district supervisors. In consequence a number of progressive schemes had been unable to start.

The original duties of the councils, mentioned previously, were carried out by pig experts. These experts were under the control of the district Pig Councils, but received their direction from the Department of Agriculture. This double control, the conference maintained, did not make for efficient and scrupulous carrying out of instructions by either the supervisor or his council.

Therefore the conference put forward these proposals: Firstly, that the name of the council should be changed to the “National Pig Improvement Council” and that body should work in con-

junction with the Herd Improvement Council. Also, its only dbject should be the improving of pig husbandy, divorced from all politics and trade pressure. Secondly, the Pig Superintendent should become an officer of the Dairy Board under the direction of Herds Improvement. This, with the officer on the herd, improving side would provide three fully trained executives, who would implement the policy of the Board. Thirdly, the district supervisors should become officers of the Dairy Board and with the six consulting officers of the Board would make 15 field instructors 'responsible for the pig and cow improvement. Finally, the conference suggested that the District Pig Councils should be wound up •

and their duties combined with the Herd Improvement Associations, which would be reorganised to include representatives of pig producing interests. One . member from the Dairy Board, it was suggested, should also sit on the Pig Improvement Council. ,

The conference considered other alternatives that could be used, but those enumerated above were thought the most workable of all.