The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE SATURDAY, APRIL 6, 1918. THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE

Taihape Daily Times, 6 April 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

SATURDAY, APRIL 6, 1918. THE SPIRIT OF THE AGE

(With wliich is Incorporated The Tai liapo Post and Waiuiuriuo News)..

The conservation of timber is a question that will continue to be one of the foremost matters to concern the people of New Zealand until science provides something to take its place, and as science, has not yet done anything practical in that respect, that aspect cannot now be taken into consideration. We must have timber for building purposes if it is only for doors and those parts of a structure that no substitute has been found for, and almost equally important is the imperative need for timber for commercial and some essential domestic purposes. The virgin forests with Avhich the land of the Maoris was so liberally, bounteously and beautifully clothed, are fast disappearing. The pioneer with his axe, in half-a-century, has made very nearly a clean sweep; there is so little left that those whose occupations depend upon timber are appealing to Government and Legislature with a view to staving on; the evil day when totara, matai, riniu, and white pine shall have become extinct for all practical commercial uses. Totara has reached a prohibitive price and rimu and matai are taking its place, but white pine is Hearing the dregs and no substitute is in sight. Therefore, dairying and other food industries that must have an inodorous timber for making containers are approaching the day when white pine will all be used up, and they are, of course, exceedingly concerned about the timberless future. The failure of Government to realise the necessities of the country in this respect is about on a par with its want of consideration for the generations that are to follow in other vitally important matters. This country is following a policy of insatiable greed, a policy of gorge, swig and luxury, of eat, drink and be merry today, for to-morrow Ave die. Is it not a misfortune to. the world such governments ever lived? Howbeit, here was found timber that would have sufficed for centuries had it been subject to sane regulation, but seeing that it *was doomed, why has nothing been grown to take its place? This country, which fifty years ago was covered with little else but the finest timber, in the world, is drifting into a timber famine. Inexorable economic laws have been and are being set at defiance; greed andJuxury have dulled the country's economic sense. iWhen food to keep human life is not grown it is hopeless in such matters as timber. Shipping and importing interests insinuate the idea that nothing matters; when luxurious requirements cannot be met.by Now Zealand grown articles, they can be. imported,, A timber famine is in sight and a conference of people most intimately affected has been held in Wellington with a view to discovering an antidote. The report of the meeting is meagre and does not attempt to enlighten the public upon the vital issues in question. A conference at which the National Efficiency Board and representatives of sawmilling, meat freezing, dairying, coopering and boxmaking were present, discussing the subject for a whole day, should have been able to furnish an intelligent report for public consumption and edification. Simmered down we find this great, comprehensive conference considered two things neither of which, it is disclosed, they came to any conclusion or agreement upon. The conference discussed the conservation of timber in the direction, we are told, of having an embargo placed on its exportation. The other matter was respecting the discovery of a substitute for white pine. The deliberations finished in the same old helpless way, in appealing to the same old hopeless Government. From such a body of business men and experts something more creditable was expected; they have not thought it worth while to take the public into their confidence in the slightest; then in which way did their arguments trend? The first law of nature, wo presume, was the basis of all that was said; the mien who want the timber were ready to immolate the men who go into the backblocks and get it, and the latter wanted to dispose of their timber in the market that furnished the best remuneration.' Old observant colonists are aware that millions of feet of useful sawn timber have rotted at the mills during the last forty or fifty years simply because while better was obtainable it was not thought good enough fer use. The same observant colonists to-day see the same old disdainful rejection of millions of feet of good timber, but the difference now is that what is spurned in New Zealand is anxiously sought for by Australia. New Zealand has a virgin supply of the only timber in Australasia that is "suitable for butter box-making; the extraordinary aspect of the white-pine ques-

tion is that New Zealanders want, wo

think unreasonably, only the timber from which wide boards are cuttable, leaving that which will only cut into smaller sizes on the miller's hands to do the best he can with. New Zealanders seem to think the millers should be stopped by law from selling their rejected product elsewhere. Of course, - there is no consideration for the miller; the economic impossibility is not appealing to them. Millers could not, of course, continue milling just to supply the wide boards New Zealand wants, therefore to stop exportation of any small odd sizes would shut down sawmilling,, otherwise New Zealanders must purchase everything cut at similar prices that are offering elsewhere. But the conference, from its report, was only temporising with the timber difficulty; it was chiefly concerned about timber for butter boxes. This is something that interests one industry, but there is the wider question of the supply of timber for all purposes being used up in the near future. The fact, is, government is not deeply concerned about any such questions affecting the near or far future. We have drifted into an individualism, in most modern times, the chief feature of which is the determination of the individual to get rich quick by any and every means, and hang tlie country, the Empire, and the rest of mankind and their future .It is positively amazing to read alongside the reports of hundreds of thousands, aggregating millions, gambled through the totalisator at race meetings, the appeals of the Minister of Finance for the loan of money at a remunerative, interest wherwith to finance the war in which we are engaged fighting for ou|| honour and freedom. In the timber/* question as in similar matters we are' a house divided against itself; we are so intent upon getting rich at the expense of our fellows that we fail to see the German slave-hunter entering our homes, and if we do see him we go so far as to disregard him by refusing to furnish the money to fight him. It seems to be the spirit of the age.