PROPOSED INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1356, 17 January 1905, Page 2

PROPOSED INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION.

VIEWS OF AN EXPERT,

SUPPORTS NEW ZEALAND EXHIBITION IN LONDON.

XPcr Press Association.)' Wellington, last night,

lu tho course o£ an interview with a Post representative, Mr R. E. N. 'Twopenny, who is an expert in exhibition matters, "referred to the proposed international exhibition at Christohurch. Regarding tho Premier’s estimate that sn expenditure of £20,000 will see the affair through, Mr Twopenny is doubtful. He thinks that a great deal of good luck and quite exceptional management will be required to keep the expenditure within that sum, if tho exhibition is to be at all adequate. Tho exponses of the Dunedin exhibition amounted to £45,000. Tho cost of the buildings are really very great. For instance tho buildings alono in Dunedin exhibition amounted to £20,000. The exhibition was a success bocause its organisation fitted their outlay to the promise of revenue, and because the 6how was patronised by the public, which was filled with a good deal of patriotism. It came just after a period of depression and it succeeded in its aim, which was to give hoart to tho colony and brush away the cobwebs of pessimism, more than to bo an irrelevant collection of tho colony's pro duce. The exhibition now projected will hardly be able to expect this patriotic stimulus. If it is run on big lines it will require a patronage which it will bo difli cult to obtain. As an inntnnoa of wbat can happen when tho 11 frost” hits an exhibition he quoted a case of the Victorian Government, whoso 1888 exhibition resulted in a loss of over a quarter of a million storling. There is one suggestion Mr Twopenny would make, and ha thinks it is almost a pity that, instead of an exhibition in New Zealand, there should not bo a New Zealand exhibition in London. Monoy would probably bo better spent if this course was adopted. Of tho success of a Colonial exhibition in London he has not any misgiving. It would introduce the colony and its industries to a profitable clientelo of Loudon public, and would by reason of its novelty and freshness secure an interest which would lend to a tangible expression in the shape of business dealings between London and ourselves. It would in short be as profitable an advertisement as could be conceived.