To Farmers

New Zealand Listener, Volume 1, Issue 14, 29 September 1939, Page 16

To Farmers

\ X 7 E print to-day an important message to farmers by the Minister of Agriculture. As a farmer himself, the Minister knows that it is easier to call for more produce than to deliver it, but he knows also that increased production is possible.'So he takes the high stand that what they may not be willing to produce. for profit they will produce for patriotism. He is.right. The farm, as he says, is a munition factory. It supplies the food and clothing for the men. who face the enemy. It also supplies the credits for the arming and protection of those men, and for the maintenance of all the men and women who stand behind them. And even in New Zealand, though we commonly forget this fact, there is one vital commodity that we do not normally produce in sufficient quantity for our own needs. That commodity is wheat. Only once’ in eight or ten years is the production of wheat equal to the home consumption. We can produce more, but we seldom do, and now we must. But the farmer has a more fundamental duty than the production of wheat for home consumption, and of meat, wool, butter and cheese for consumption overseas. He must plan and he must conserve. It falls on him, and almost on him alone, to guard against the depletion of supplies at their source. His problem, in short, is to resist the temptation to short-circuit his answer to the Minister’s appeal. Important though it is to supply meat and wool and butter and cheese in steadily increasing quantities, it is more important still to maintain the fertility of the soil, the quality of the live-stock, the necessary proportion of breeding animals. Or, to put it another way, he must protect the foundations of his factory as vigilantly as he watches its intake and output. He is on the last line of defence.