THE DAIRY INDUSTRY

Otago Witness, Issue 4029, 2 June 1931, Page 15

THE DAIRY INDUSTRY

IMPORTANT CONFERENCE BOARD VISITS MASSEY COLLEGE. PALMERSTON N., May 28. 1 Considerable significance for the dairy Industry is associated with a visit to Palmerston North by the Dairy Produce Board, which made an inspection of the Massey Agricultural College. Later it met to discuss important matters. Professor Riddet (director of the Dairy Research Institute) welcomed the board members, who, following an inspection of the land, buildings, and general appointments of the college, held a conference With the institute. At night there was an important meeting of the special committee recently established by the conference of dairying interests in Wellington to go into the problem relating to cheese manufacture. This gathering was convened in. co-opera-tion with the Dairy Produce Board. The function of the committee is primarily to consider important aspects of cheese quality (including matunty), to formu-

late suggestions, and to submit recommendations regarding these for consideration at the ; forthcoming meeting of the National Dairy Association.

THE WHEAT DUTIES MR COATES’S ATTITUDE “STAND BY THE FARMER.” CHRISTCHURCH May 31. “ I believe this sliding scale of wheat duties is sound, and I know that if the wheatgrower’s costs of production are brought down he is quite prepared to supply his wheat at reduced cost,” said the Leader of the Opposition (Mr J. G. Coates), speaking at the Ellesmere Gun Club’s dinner last night. “ Although in my own district in the North Island there has been considerable dissent about the wheat duties, I want you to remember this: I believe that the farmer of New Zealand is deserving of his opportunity.

“We shall have to arrange matters so that the wheat and barley grower will not suffer because of fluctuation in the world’s markets,” said Mr Coates. “In the North Island one gets tired of defending the duties, but I have a very simple little creed— ‘ Stand by the farmer? Our own historj’ indicates that violent fluctuations in bread prices have cost the country thousands.” Addressing another meeting earlier in the day, Mr. Coates said: “Although I come from the north, I have always been keenly interested in the point that New Zealand should grow sufficient wheat to be assured of safety in any world fluctuations.”

MR TERRY AND WHITE FLOUR TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —The articles by Mr Terry are very interesting and very instructive, but I am surprised that he should be so carried away by his evident dread of being termed a ‘‘faddist” as to approve of the use of white flour. There are certain aspects of this question which I think he has overlooked and which many others, including medical men, who appreciate white flour and consequently approve of it, have also overlooked. W’ith “ God’s favourite scoundrel, Man,” the wish is father to the thought to an infinitely greater extent than is generally supposed. First, Mr Terry should remember that although we eat other foods—foods which he tells us supply the deficiencies of white flour, occasionally and intermittently—we eat white flour all the time. There are very, very few meals eaten by anj'one which do not include a certain amount of bread, biscuit, cake, or pudding compounded , of white flour. One of the most objectionable features of an utterly objectionable and foolish practice, that of regularly indulging in morning and afternoon tea, and possibly supper, in addition to. three good meals, is that almost everything eaten at those midway snacks is compounded of white flour and sugar. Secondly, Mr Terry makes a point of telling up, very properly, that the best properties of all fruits and vegetables lie in their outer covering. This is doubtless due to the increased amount of sunlight received and stored up by the outer parts but prevented from penetrating to the inner. Is it not likely, even certain, that the same holds good in the case of cereals? And yet he sets his seal of approval on an article of food—a food which is used much more widely than any. other and consists solely of the inner, starchy part of the grain from which it is made! The wicked feature of the whole wretched business is that we are defrauded "of our birthright. We cannot get whole meal. The millers do not supply it. The wheatmeal they sell is not, I atn informed, whole meal. Weet-: bix of Granose biscuits, I believe, include the whole grain, but they are too crumblyto come into general use as a substitute for bread. They are, however, excellent' in their way. No, I hold no shares ini the Sanatorium Health Food Company. 1 wish I did.. I would boost whole wheat products with infinite pleasure and an.en-': tirely clear conscience, but if I had any-' thing to do with the-manufacture or sale of the over-refined and dangerously at-; tractive article in which our misguided, millers specialise, I should consider that I had become one of those unhappy misdemeanants “ through whom offences come” and that “it were better that a millstone were hanged about my neck and I were cast into the sea”! Alas! there are no millstones available for that or any other purpose nowadays. Their , use, as necklets, would, in this instance, be most appropriately and peculiarly fitting, but they, like the good old horse, have been displaced by a hateful substitute, similarly devised by the silly “ scoundrel ” above referred to, and each such substitute with its .attendant evils is leaving a trail of death and devastation with which we could very well have dispensed. For the benefit of the many readers who will say this is, in the case of flour, exaggerated nonsense, let me add a few. words to a letter already too long. Years ago I read the opinion of a distinguished 'member of the dental profession on modern customs in relation to food, and half a dozen words of it I do not forget: “ We are slowly poisoning our, little children ”! Strong language, but none the worse for that. —I am. etc.,

_ . I vox A. Borton. Palmerston, May 23.