NRS-194 | War Agricultural Committee correspondence files

Full description

During the Second World War, the Department organised and worked a State-wide system of District and Local War Agricultural Committees as an aid to food production. The Committees were conceived early in 1942 in the first instance as rural man-power advisory committees. By the end of 1942, they were established with broad, advisory functions and were designated "War Agricultural Committees". The last official circular issued by the Executive Officer of the NSW War Agricultural Committee was in 1946. (1)  Their aims broadly, were a fair distribution of agricultural aids in short supply and the local planning of co-operative efforts to secure the most effective use of such facilities - manpower, fertilisers, vehicles, tyres, fuel, building and fencing materials, labour hostels and so on.

There were, in due course, some 52 District War Agricultural Committees and some 1,500 Local War Agricultural Committees functioning in the advisory and planning fields to help the State use its wartime food production resources most effectively.

The correspondence contents extends beyond the official establishment of the Committee due to press clippings or ongoing correspondence about unresolved issues.

Arrangement is by a classified running number sequence, prefixed by the letters 'I & E'. Resolved, or 'once-only' matters have been grouped together, designated as "Dead Files". These lack the 'I & E' prefix, and follow a separate allocated "Dead File" numerical running sequence.
 
Endnote
1. NRS 196