WORK ON THE LAND

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 3, Issue 622, 29 August 1933, Page 4

WORK ON THE LAND

In a recent address to the Young Farmers' Clubs of Great Britain Professor J. A. S. Watson made a remarlc which might well be commended to many edncationalists in New1 Zealand but more particularly to the rising generation. "Above all, we want to kill this rotten old no- j tion that farming is an inferior job for inferior people," said the professor and the remark is nowhere more applicable than in New Zealand. Unfortunately an attitude has grown up in this, and in many other countries, that the cultivation of the soil and its allied industries is the proper destination for the dull boy of the family while the Public Service, professional and clerical positions, are reserved for the brighter boy. It may be ~

nrgued with some justification, of course, that the present standard of wages being paid cadets in the Public Service and in many professional avocations is so low thaf there has ceased to be anything desirable about them. There are still, however, many amenities connected with city positions which are missed entirely by the boy who commences his career on the farm. Brighter boys being somewhat akin to water in finding their own level, the inevitable result has been that the brighter boys have had the plums and the others have had to be content with what they could pick up. Fortunately a realisation now appears to be dawning that if New Zealand primary industries are to survive, boys must be encouraged to go on the land, not only by exhortation but by developing a changed attitude toward the cultivation of the land. If boys are to be expected to go on the land and take it up as their life career, they must be offered some prospeets beyond those of the farm Iabourer. But even more important is the necessity to combat the supercilious attitude toward farming as the job for the man who is not sufficiently intelligent to go out and do anything else. His

Excelleney, the Governor-Gen-eral, has emphasised this necessity on many occasions and it could well be given greater emphasis by many sections of the community who would find their attitude toward farming considerably changed if all farmers decided to abandon the land to itself or to their mortgagors and seek the amenities of the cities. Farming is not an inferior job for inferior people but the most important job in the country for the best stock which the country can produce.