THE FIREBLIGHT DISEASE

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 93, 13 January 1921, Page 5

THE FIREBLIGHT DISEASE

AIMS OF AGRICULTURAL DEPARTMENT.

"It is a matter of great regret that the very serious disease known as fireblight lias become established in the northern portion of the Dominion, ’ remarked the Minister of Agriculture, in addressing the Nurserymen’s Conference yesterday. “This disease is undoubtedly one of the mosti serious visitations of its kind with which this country has ever had. to contend. Not only is the nursery industry in the Auckland province likely to be very materially affected, but orchards and certain classes of shelter belts and plantations in the affected area are liable to most serious damage unless the disease is effectually controlled. The Department is doing all that it possibly can to hold the disease in check, and the active and intelligent co-operation of the nurserymen is confidently anticipated by the Government.” Tho Minister added that the Department’s aim was to localise the disease, and lip thought that within a year it would be able to report thari considerable progress had been made. Touching on another point, he said that the destruction of hawthorn hedges and fruit trees affected by rhe disease was a matter on ’which 'he Government was being approached for compensation. He questioned whether it was the Government’s duty to foot the bill. There • was a limit to what the Government could do, and what the taxpayers of the country could stand. Concluding, he said Hmt he proposed shortly to visit Auckland and inspect the affected areas. ■ The matter was referred to by the president (Mr. R. Nairn, of Christchurch) in the following terms in the course of his address to the conference:— "The threat of the fireblight to overwhelm the fruit industry should be seriously considered, yet not without hope for a cure for this dreaded scourge. Again and again during the years that are past we have had the fruit - industry threatened, yet it is still a valued industry in the land. Some of us remember how the scale blight, which attacked pears, apples, hawthorns, and other trees, proved a menace for the time, and dire consequences were foretold; yet to-day if is hardly heard of. The antidote for all our troubles is to be found if we have the grit and gumption to discover and apply it.”