TUNG OIL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 December 1938, Page 8

TUNG OIL

REPORT "BY DEPARTMENT CHALLENGED SAID TO BE MISLEADING AND UNFAIR. PROTEST BY CORPORATION DIRECTOR. (By Telegranh—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, December 21. Strong exception was taken by Mr J. E. Ray, managing director of New Zealand Tung Oil Corporation, today to statements quoted from the December issue of the “Journal of Agriculture.” “Statements based on the position two years ago are obviously unfair,” he said. The article objected to included a summary stating that in 10 tung oil plantations in the Dominion there were 55 acres of apparently satisfactory trees, 733 acres of unsatisfactory trees and 3760 acres of wqrthless, dead and dying trees. The plantations of Mr Ray’s company were credited with having 37 acres of apparently satisfactory trees, 585 acres of unsatisfactory trees and 1551 acres of worthless, dead and dying trees. Commenting on this, Mr Ray asserted that his company, which was the first in the field in this industry, had now at least 200 acres of trees well grown and bearing. “The report is antiquated, and we will press some oil on the place within the next six months,” he said. “We are on the verge of purchasing and erecting a pressing plant to handle this year’s crop. Laboratory tests made last year clearly indicated that the oil we produced in Kaikohe was on a par with the best tung oil grown in the United States of America, both as to oil percentage and quality.” In protest against the report appearing in the “Journal of Agriculture,” the New Zealand Tung Oil Corporation has forwarded the following telegram to the Minister of Industries and Commerce, Mr Sullivan' and to the Minister of Agriculture, Mr Lee Martin: — “A prominent article on tung oil has been widely published by newspapers. Though reported as a precis of an article in a journal published under the aegis of the Government, the original of which has not y s et been published in Auckland, the report is so far as the New Zealand Tung Oil Corporation Limited and its two affiliated companies is concerned, is both incorrect and damaging and does not in any way represent the conditions of our plantations today. “In December, 1936, and February and March, 1937, on the invitation of our companies, an officer of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research visited our plantations. If any further visits or investigations have been made they have been without our knowledge or consent, either direct or ■ indirect, and consequently could pot be complete or authoritative. “The companies from their inception 1 and for their own purposes have had regular reports as to the condition of the plantations. Within the past three months, being the first possible, fruiting season, they have had close inspections and reports prepared by both their own officers and competent independent experts. These reports indicate that there are now on the company’s own plantations a far greater area of trees in actual bearing than the report states to be as ‘apparently satisfactory’ for the whole of New Zealand and further large areas not yet in bearing are in good condition. “The corporation after one year’s experiment withdrew from Kaukapakapa six years ago, and since that time ; has not operated in that district. It , never has had any plantation in Waipapa. The release of such a mislead- . ing and erroneous report which can , do incalculabe harm to a bona fide , and promising undertaking, appears in- , consistent with the well-known and of- ( ten-repeated need of the development . of a self-sustaining industry in New j Zealand.” <

Mr Ray said his company’s trees were grown from seed brought from Florida, and from several hundred budded stocks, which had all grown. They had raised trees from their own seed and this New Zealand acclimatised stock bade fair to surpass in growth anything they had had from Florida. They had 2500 acres of trees in various stages of growth, and prospering best where the shelter belts ■ were most developed. Their shelter ■ belts extended to a length of 156 miles. Photographs shown by Mr Ray indicated that some of the tung oil trees had now reached a height of about 14ft. “We have a substantial reserve behind us to see this job through,” said Mr Ray, "and we are quite convinced in our own minds that we will finish it. We are not selling share bonds, and have not been doing so for the past 18 months.” STATEMENT BY MINISTER. THE DEPARTMENTAL SURVEY. Reference to the official inquiry into ihe state of tung oil plantations in New Zealand was made by the Minister of Agriculture, Mr Lee Martin, in an interview last evening. He said that he had himsef inspected these plantations about seven months ago, and as a result of the unfavourable impression he gained from that visit arrangements had been made for a proper survey by the Department of Agriculture, which had had the collaboration of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research in making the investigation. AN EXPERT’S OPINION. REPORT BASED ON WRONG CONCLUSIONS. AUCKLAND, December 21. “For a semi-official publication such as the ‘Journal of Agriculture' to publish a report based upon wrong conclusions reached almost two years ago by investigators inexperienced in the practice of arboriculture is most unfair,” said Professor H. H. Corbin, technical adviser to the New Zealand Tung Oil Corporatoin. He was quite sure, he said, that only one investigation had ever been made of the New Zealand Tung Oil Corporation’s properties and groves, and it had been quite obvious even then that the investigators had formed some wrong opinion, as he had pointed out in a fairly comprehensive memorandum to members of the research council of the Department fo Scientific and Industrial Research in September of last year. “Genuine progress has been made to- j, ward establishing the new industry.” he said, “and at a time when, it has] reached a stage of having a satisfac-1' lory proportion of its groves bearing! i prolific-ally it is most unfair to be sub-!, jected to what is tantamount to a gen- ' oral indictment based on entirely un- . sound premises.” |]