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Submission by Convener of the Conservation Committee of the Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand.
The following statement has been prepared by the convener of the Sub-committee as the time available since the receipt of the invitation has been too short for adequate consultation.
In any event our contribution to a discussion on the specific question of the relationship of mammals to environment would at this stage be brief. Whatever the qualifications or opinions of its individual members may be, the Royal Society assumes no special knowledge of any aspect of the noxious animal situation, but it is concerned to uphold and assert the importance of the application of scientific research to all aspects of this problem as part of the wider matter of the conservation of natural resources.
We consider that the issue has too often been obscured by the ventilation in many official conferences since the year 1924 of the kind of views and attitudes that are more normally and harmlessly expressed in the correspondence columns of newspapers. Some of these are:—
| (a) |
Too great reliance on the force of purely emotive adjectives. |
| (b) |
Too ready imputation of bias and ulterior motive in the views of those who seem to be opposed. |
| (c) |
Too much reliance on traditional dicta (the so-called “clichés”) and reluctance to re-examine them. |
| (d) |
A surviving tendency to regard research techniques as something brought in to find a short cut when the main issue has been already decided by majority opinion or a direct decision of existing authority. |
We concede that conferences such as the present one have some co-ordination value when a strict order of reference is adhered to, but we re-affirm that the research needed for effective conservation is so complex and inter-related that the need in New Zealand as elsewhere is for a permanent Conservation Research Council or similar body that will have the resources to
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collate factual information from the whole field and be able to supervise co-ordination. Its function in regard to research might well be advisory rather than directive. In our opinion the minimum standards of qualification and organisation for research operating in the several Government departments concerned with the present problem now and over the past ten years vary so widely that there has been much ineffectual attempt at co-ordination and misdirection of effort. We recognise that much has been done recently to improve the situation, but consider that the effectiveness of research programmes would be improved by extra departmental supervision such as only a permanent co-ordinating body could provide.
The foregoing may be considered as having little bearing on the immediate questions before the conference. It is offered on the assumption that future courses of action will be considered. The Society's representative at the meeting will be prepared to make further contribution as required, and the Conservation Committee will be prepared to undertake further study of the research aspects of any programme that may be proposed. We consider that there is need for better organisation of biological research at all levels of conservation problems.
R. A. Falla. (Convener),
Conservation Committee, Royal Society of New Zealand.