FINDING A REMEDY

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 300, 10 March 1928, Page 27

FINDING A REMEDY

CABBAGES AND UNEMPLOYMENT

NOVEL TAUPO EXPERIMENT

'•HUMPING Matilda” through the dust aud heat, hundreds fl of men have tramped Xorth Island roads throughout the summer in a wearisome and seemingly endless search for steady work. Back country stations where a few years ago a competent stationhand was always assured of a job, now turn away five and six applicants daily. A feed, a place under a roof to unroll liis blanket and, in most cases, a snack for the road at the most, is what meets the footsore sundowner as he turns in at the back country homestead to-day. A steady job falls to the lot of only the most fortunate.

•“Plenty of work in the country,” bays the thoughtless; and self-satisfied man in the street. A few years ago when all the bush was coming down and development work was being carried out on a large scale bushffJling in the winter, and fencing and grass •• seeding in the summer, supported a large floating population of unskilled and partly skilled men. To-day, all is changed. Two of three shepherds and a station hand can control a large block which in its early development days supported staffs of 30 to 40 men in almost constant employment. Thus, the swagger for the most part jn his weary quest throughout the country is little better off than the

unemployed of the city. He can only hope to be taken on in place of someone quitting a steady job which in all probability' has several waiting for it. Even the job of a cowboy on x dairy farm, cor sidened in the past one of the least attractive positions the country had to offer, can now depend upon 30 to 40 applicants if given due publicity in the advertisement columns of the newspaper. In face of such a state of affairs it is refreshing, therefore, to find at least one group of unemployed who have set about to find a way out of their difficulties. A few months ago the owners of a 68,000 block near the foot of Mount Ruapehu found it necessary to put off ten men. Their contract had been completed, and though several of them had been working on the station for a number of years, nothing could be found to keep them in profitable employment. In other words, they were faced with the proposition of going “down the road.” Then a novel idea was suggested. Little of the 68,000 block was fenced, but the bulk of it was ploughable. What about growing cabbages for the city markets? Situated practically in the middle of the Island, they could feed Wellington, Auckland, Wanganui, or Napier. The owners, ]yi esHrs - Lysnar Bros., gave the suggestion their fullest support. The land was offered free of charge and with each man on an equal basis well over 20 seres of land was turned over with the station implements, and cabbages and cauliflowers planted with a liberal sowing of manure. To-day on land that is thought among many North Island sheep men to be too poor to warrant attention, a healthy crop is com.ng away and soon cabbages will be consigned to all parts of tiie island. All indications are that the venture will be a highly profitable one. In any case the men are better employed than tramping about the

roads, or even working on unproductive unemployment relief works. Further, these men have shown that even on what was thought to be unprofitable tussock lands over 2,000 feet above the sea in the Taupo district profitable crops can be grown. It gives, in fact, impetus to the suggestion which has emanated from several quarters that the unemployed should be utilised in an endeavour to develop : , much of the idle land of the North . Island. Certainly all could not grow L cabbages, but undoubtedly, with the right men under proper conditions and supervision where public money was ! concerned, it appears that there is room ’ for worthwhile experimental work.