my Country Notebook

Otago Witness, Issue 4028, 26 May 1931, Page 33

my Country Notebook

by

Murihiku

(Special for the Otago Witness.) An interesting heading in the dailv paper:— NO FEAR. Reading on, one found that it was Mr Forbes who had no fear for tiie future. Aly companion commented. “No fear! _ And no policy, and no money! lhe Noes have it. ’ I need not sav that my elderly companion thinks he knows all about parliamentary procedure. . * YThe wheatgrowers have now had their shock. Instead of getting somewhere round about 5s lOd per bushel at average country stations, the new duties will give them—they say—about 4s, and Air Forbes says 4s Gd per bushel. Apparently. the Prime Alinister’s departmental experts have an idea that bv further reducing the duties on flour, he will get at the flourniillers. But the flourmiller will have to compete with imported Australian flour, and he will lower the price of wheat to the wheatgrower. The Prime Alinister may think the grower will get 4s 6d, but the stock and station agents say that 4s will be the return, and they will not finance anybody to grow wheat at that price.

Wheat is the last of our products to drop below the cost of production. This year butter and cheese are in a desperate position, and Russian butter will complete the debacle. In looking back I find the highest and the lowest years for butter-fat pay-outs were: —

What will the pay-out be this year now finishing? Perhaps nearer * the 1907-8 season than any other. *** n* Some of our labour friends have weird ideas about what causes prosperity. Read this from a man who is believed to be very intelligent. The most prosperous time this country ever had, when work was the most plentiful, was when wages were the highest; that was because the money paid as wages was spent by the workers on the retail business, and by being circulated in that way kept up the demand for work. It was only when wages began to fall that business began to contract and depression set in. Surely it was not the high wages that made the prosperity? The prosperity started when we got big money for our wool and meat, our butter anil cheese. That started the whole thing. Our exports were bringing in big money, so we could afford to import more goods. Everybody in the transporting and distributing trades were busily employed handling business of all sorts. If a high wage in itself is a good thing, why not give everybody in New Zealand—except the farmer, I suppose—five pounds a week? Would it make us more prosperous if we made- it ten pounds per week ?

Farmers hawking meat for sale in the towns of New Zealand have caused an outcry from the established butchers, who have to be registered, and pay all sorts of fees. A Christchurch butcher recently pointed out that over-inspection added greatly to the cost of meat. He then compiled the following list:— Inspector of Cruelty to Animals. Inspector of Cattle Insurance. Inspector of Timekeeper. Inspector of Tally Inspector. Inspector of Abattoir. Inspector of Carting. Inspector of Shop (Health and City Council). Inspector of Weights and Aleasures. Inspector of Wages Book. Inspector of Water. Inspector of Gas. Inspector of Electricity. Inspector of Alachinery. Inspector of Registration of Factory. Etc. The “ ot cetera ” are evidently meant for the inspectors of inspectors to see that the other inspectors do their duty! Certainly it looks as if the inspectors could do with a 10 per cent. cut. But it would appear that if half of the inspectors were retrenched, the unemployed problem would be enormous! V Those of us who knew the England of pre-war days and during the war were convinced that we New Zealanders were the champion tea drinkers of the world.

Now we know that we are not. The yeai 1931 will go down in hstorv as the }ear in which the New Zealanders beat Alarylcbone, but in 1930 the English beat us badly at tea drinking. Fite cups of tea per dav per head is the average for Great Britain, reports the Imperial Economic Committee, which has compiled the following averages:— United Kingdom 9.2 pounds. Australia. .. .. 8.1,5 ” New Zealand' .. 7.9 ” Irish Free State 7.9 ” Newfoundland .. 5.46 ” Canada .. ~ 3.1 ” Holland .. .. 3.1 ” Alorocco .. .. 2.31 ” This all goes to show what erroneous impressions we have. Alorocco I always associated with coffee. Certainly coffee is the beverage most used in the* United States, where only 0.75 pounds of tea per head is consumed. On the other hand I always thought that Russia was a tea-drinking country, but her yearly consumption per head is only' 0.60 pounds.

Year. Cheese Butter. Pay-out. Pay-out. (1. d. 1904-5 9.00 9.64 1907-8 11.92 10.28 1913-14 14.38 13.81 1918-19 24.02 19.11 1919-20 25.20 20.00 1920-21 29.37 33.00 1921-22 18.00 10.50 1928-29 19.50 18.25