GREATER PRODUCTION.

Taranaki Daily News, 24 May 1919, Page 4

GREATER PRODUCTION.

In his address to the Farmers' Union Conference yesterday the President (Mr Robert Dunn) emphasised the need for encouraging settlement and increasing production. It is, of course, not the first time he has done so, for many years ago, before he had gained his present eminence in the Farmers' Union, he consistently advocated a more energetic and comprehensive policy of development, as indeed did others who had the welfare of the country at heart and were gifted with perception. It is now more than ever the greatest question before us. The necessities of the times demand that it should be tackled without further delay and dealt with on broad and comprehensive lines. We owe this to our returned men as well as to ourselves. We have mortgaged our future $o pay for our share in the war, and only by increasing production oan we expect to get ahead of our obligations. New Zealand is probably in a better position than most of the other belligerents, for it depends primarily upon the products of its soil, for which the world is hungry, and has great areas of land that have yet to be turned to their full use. If these were brought rapidly into cultivation, our exports would increase with the expansion of settlement, there would be employment for all our own people and hundreds of thousands of others from Home besides, and the five millions a year war debt would not press unduly upon a prosperous and Increasing population. Any man who goes about New Zealand with his eyes open must realise the splendid prospects before the country, if only the Government would do its part by building railways and constructing roads through the waste and undeveloped country, not to speak of preventing land aggregation and cutI ting tip the first-class and accessible land hold in large areas by private in-1 dividuals. We should embark upon a vigorous public works development policy having for its object the bringing within reach of market all the rich and fertile jands of the Dominion, The time has come to alter our tin-pot ineffective methods where highly necessary and important works are carried out at a snail's pace—as, for instance, on the Stratford line, the average rate of construction of which has been something like two miles a year! This sort of thing must be stopped, and a more j business-like and efficient policy adopted. Where is the money coming from? This will be the cry of some of the timid souls who have been misgoverning the country for so long. The reply is that a country that can raise ffor. "war purposes the money New Zealand has during the past two or three years can easily find the money for reproductive and development work of this important char- j acter. New Zealand, let it be borne in mind, can only prosper in proportion to the encouragement given to land settlement and the opportunities provided for increasing the yield of wealth from the soil, and for once again drawing farmers' attention to this essential fact the president of the Taranaki Farmers' Union "is to be commended.