Economic aspects of agricultural education and training in New Zealand

Abstract

In view of the rapid growth of agricultural education and training and the amount of Government funding involved, it is questioned whether the system inherited from the past is equipped to serve the best interests of the industry in the future (Elworthy 1983). This issue was raised in relation to the way the industry has got by in the past with light handed and informal procedures for coordination, but whether the present system of agricultural education serves the best interests of the industry raises more fundamental issues than that of coordination (even though that issue is no doubt of considerable importance). There are in fact three basic questions which need to be considered in any comprehensive examination of the policy for agricultural education and training: (a) what precisely does agricultural education and training contribute towards the best interests of the industry and just what is meant by that phrase? (b) what level of total funding of agricultural education and training is appropriate, in the light of the present situation of the economy as a whole and the part played by the agricultural sector in that situation? (c) what is the most cost efficient distribution of the total funding, determined after consideration of (b) above, between the various agricultural education and training programmes and the different institutions involved? These are complex questions which go to the heart of a rational policy on agricultural education and training. They are, however, not just theoretical ones; decisions are made on the level of funding and on the allocation between different programmes and institutions (or rather, what appears to happen at present is that decisions are made on amounts to be paid to the different institutions and organisations, and these together add up to the total funding that is provided by the Government).