THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is Incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, FRIDAY. “ Public Service.” FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 1944. THE FOOD FRONT

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume 53, Issue 32408, 17 March 1944, Page 4

THE Hauraki Plains Gazette With which is Incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, FRIDAY. “ Public Service.” FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 1944. THE FOOD FRONT

Two official statements on successive days have driven home to New Zealanders the' potential seriousness of the food situation in Britain, and these statements should have done more than anything else in recent months to convince the Dominion that the crisis of shipping has been replaced by a graver crisis of production. Mr W. Bankes Amery, leader of the British Food Mission to Australia and New Zealand, has stated that British food rations are in considerable danger for the remainder of 1944. And Sir Jack Drummond, chief scientific adviser to the Ministry of Food, has warned that a further cut in rations may affect the efficiency and health of the British people. Reduced to their fundamentals, these statements are a direct appeal to the Governments and people of Australia and New Zealand to recognise the gravity of the food crisis, to readjust their war effort accordingly, and to act with an urgency and determination appropriate to the need. This calls for no temporary expedient, or for a shortlived effort to boost production; It requires the drastic overhaul of the foundations on which the Dominion’s war effort has been built. Indeed, it poses the question whether a New Zealander’s contribution to the Allied war effort henceforward will not be more valuable on a farm than in the front line. And if a prophecy can be attempted it is that soon the hard facts of the food crisis will cause the Dominion’s overseas efforts to be steadily reduced to her home effort as steadily accelerated. The puzzle is that this urgent readjustment has not already progressed further than, it has.. So far there are only hesitant’ signs of a Government recognition that the maintenance of a division in the Middle East and another in the Pacific, and the fulfilment of air force commitments, are together placing an impossible strain on the Dominion’s manpower resources, and are preventing any large-scale increase in food production. It is true that the scope for food rationing in New Zealand has been extended, but this, although necessary, is a “passive” act; what is so urgently needed is an active policy designed to increase production at the source. Rationing merely has made up a little of the leeway caused by the drop in production; it has not, and cannot, solve the major food crisis. There are signs in statements by the Prime Minister, by manpower officials, and by production council representatives of a pending overhaul of the Dominion’s war effort in the light of present circumstances. Recent statements should lead public opinion to demand this overhaul without further delay. The country is prepared, and is asking, for a drastic revision of the basis of its war effort, convinced that the Dominion is unique among the Allied countries in its capacity to produce more health-giving and strength-sus-taining food per man-hour than any other country. Britain today is bracing herself for a supreme effort in Europe, and in this tortured continent the human family soon will have to accept the great and urgent responsibilities of succouring millions of people. In its short history New Zealand has never been in greater need of a leadership of vision and of an energy in direction as it is to-day. The food front must be held against the dangers that threaten, and New Zealand’s duty is clear-cut and undeniable.