WHEAT GROWING

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3090, 22 May 1917, Page 6

WHEAT GROWING

Sir,—Your correspondents' arguments in yotir issue of 15th inst. are unassailable, and lead us to hark back to February of 1915, when the question was also most acute. Then we had it demonstrated that our wheat area had been decreased from 322,000 to 190,000 acres, and urgent appeals were made to the farmers' patriotism to grow more wheat. How much heed was given to the practical advice and laudable sentiment then expressed is in evidence from the figures now before us. Tho Government, by securing foreign wheat at a cost and a loss to the Dominion which may never be fully realised, because not likely ever to be revealed, allayed the panic for the time being. We paid the. price with as good a grace as possible, and. then metaphorically went to sleep over the matter. To-day the clarion'sounds again, and from north to south may it wake up our farmers to a full realisation of the position. The old-time spirit of self-reliance has been sadly blunting of late, and the prevailing apathy and complacency is threatening to land us in troublous straights. That New Zealand should be short of foodstuffs for the consumption of its own population discounts very much of its ability to help the Empire cause. To expect the Empire, at deadly grip with the implacable foe, to release shipping for supply of the needs which should be available within oiit own borders betokens a callous selfishness and worse. "God's Own Country," why? Let the proud boast perish whon we cannot, or will not, in the hour of our country's direst peril, produce enough foodstuffs for our own use. Ungrateful, selfish cubs of the Mother who bred us when we seek to divert for our own use the facilities and resources upon which she is absolutely dependent if she is to be the victor in the titanic struggle now waging. • '

The Minister of Agriculture is seeing us through, say oaf philosophic friends. Iβ heP He has purchased, but can he got the shipping? In 1915 such was available, Not so now. In any case, the economic loss of his transactions to tlin Dominion will be appalling, and a still dearer loaf to the consumer will be inevitable. Besides the humiliation of it! A country rich in agricultural soil 'dependent upon its neighbour, and at its. mercy, at any time is bad policy, and at the present crisis in Hip world's affairs is absolute folly. Reliance upon spoon-feeding by the Government - b»-ifi'-cii" a regrettable deterioration. We have the country and we have the means. We have everv incentive, and are faced with tho absolute necessity for growing ■more wheat. Our kith and kin are even tioiy suffering from a shortage of food.

,Our men in the training camps at Home are on short rations. We canot get ships to send them the meat'with which our stores are packed. Shall wo Iμ cravens to filch from the eupplies which. ar,e urgently required to win the fight? Let our tetter natures, our self-respect, onr patriotism, respond to the clarion call for the cultivation of at least all that is necessary for our own consumption, sparing all" we can for the Empire's need.—l oiu, etc., "ANXIOUS. ,