Let's Have Copra

And Cocoa First, Mr. Ward!

Blind Concentration on "Native

Industries" Still the Keynote

MR. WARD, Australian Minister for External Territories, has been in Canada and USA, studying rail transportation with a view to brighten ing up Australian railways. (He is, of course, also Minister for Transport.) North American efficiency in this line, has inspired him to lyrical newspaper phrases and some rosy dreams, which is perhaps ironical when one remembers that American railways are run by pri vate enterprise.

But he has not entirely forgotten his alternate role of Guardian of Native Rights.

In Washington on August 25, he found time to state that, some day, Australia might become independent of India for tea, and South America for coffee, by growing these commodities in Papua and New Guinea. An English tea expert was now on his way to Papua-New Guinea, he said. He would determine likely tea growing areas.

Mr. Ward said that although climate and soil in the Territories were suitable for sugar and pineapple production, these would not be grown as they would com pete with Australia’s own home industries.

What Mr. Ward did not state to American journalists was that the tea enterprise (and probably coffee) was to be based on native industry. The Mt.

Hagen area is the location favoured for the tea experiment. This area is closed to European settlement (and even visitors) and it is hoped that the local natives will- be induced to take part in the Government-sponsored industry. It is expected that the establishment of the tea industry, in this way, will take any thing up to 50 years.

First-grade coffee is already grown in the Wau district of New Guinea and has been grown in New Britain and in Papua.

In Papua an attempt was made by Sir Hubert Murray to interest the Papuans in the coffee industry, but with indiffer ent success.

While there is no reason why the Aus tralian government should not try to build up native interest in these two branches of agriculture, this is certainly not the time to make this the corner stone of administrative agricultural policy.

While these long-range experiments are claiming priority attention, the estab lished industries of the Territories copra and cocoa are languishing for want of Administration support and sym pathy.

Never before has there been such op portunity and incentive for increased pro duction of these products both are bringing record prices in the hungry world of to-day. If the Australian gov ernment and the New Guinea Adminis tration were 100 per cent, behind Euro pean planters in the Territories, they could be doing a service to mankind, to the planters, and to the Australian Government. Instead, we have the spec tacle of Mr. Ward babbling in Washing ton, not of the good industries that are already in existence, but of tea and C9ffee, which he intends to pin, willy nilly, upon the Mt. Hagen natives. Even if the Hagen area proves suitable for tea, the Hagen natives have the normal amount of cussedtness and damn-all atti tude to sustained labour, and it has yet to be proved that they can be deeply stirred by the task of providing Australia with its tea requirements.

Tea and coffee are pleasant beverages;

but NG copra and cocoa really could help to fill the empty bellies of Europe.