DEARER MEAT.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 125, 2 July 1914, Page 6

DEARER MEAT.

A SHARP RISE INEVITABLE.

SERIOUS OUTLOOK FOB HOUSEHOLDERS. [By the Agricultural Editor of THE SUN.] If the present prices of stock continue, meat must go up by leaps and bounds. We cannot continue long as the prices are now.—Statement of a city butcher to a representative of THE SUN. ' What the city consumer will have to pay for his pound of chops ere the winter is out is at present hard to forecast, but it may be taken for granted that record prices will rule. That meat will go higher is only to be expected as the winter weather shortens the supply.

Butchers in turn will have to exact a little more from the consumer or face disaster. It may be assumed that mutton and beef will both rise in price within the next few weeks. The turnip crops this year were very light, and farmers will not be able to hold Supplies unless they are particularly favourably circumstanced. Yesterday at Addington saleyards there was a large number of sheep sold at from 37/6 to 44/-.' A Heavy Export. The exporters, on account of good prices at Home, are remaining in the business though the season is so far advanced, and are still buying for the Home trade. The turnip shortage has caused graziers to risk their sheep on the market instead of holding a quantity back for winter consumption, so that when August is reached it may be. expected that the fat sheep available for butchers to draw upon will be strictly limited. Furthermore the quality is not likely to be of the primest. Canterbury usually - draws largely upon the North Island for winter beef, but the indications are that this source will be practically closed this year. Freezing companies in the north have practically skimmed the markets of all the available beef for export, and it is only stray lots that will find their way south. . The march of dairying in the north is pushing the beef grower further back. The slaughtering of calves in dairying districts that was practised so much three or four,years ago is now being felt. This is a particularly real cause of the scarcity of local supplies, but supply and demand will right this. What it Costs the Butcher. Most of the mutton sold yesterday would have cost the buyers 4Jkl to 5d per lb when hung up in their - shops, and when cutting up is finished it means dear joints. Taking the present prices as a gauge and all the attendant circumstances, it does not seem unreasonable that the butchers' sheep will range higher than this before the spring relieves the situation. Certainly the , freezing buyers will drop out in a week or so, but the present volume of supply cannot last. Much of the mutton sold recently has been too high priced for the exporters to handle, and consequently they have had to content themselves with operating upon the lower grades of sheep. One of the contributing factors to the high price was the dearth of young

breeding ewes experienced in the autumn. Thousands of ewes that would, in an ordinary season, have been fattened up, were reserved for breeding again, the inordinately high rate ruling for good young ewes causing many farmers to cull their flocks very lightly, if at all.

Despite early wintry weather, the grass has lasted well, and this fact has contributed to the yardings at Addinglon being as large, or larger than usual, notwithstanding the turnip shortage. This has had the effect of helping growers to fatten up their sheep early, and as supplies of supplementary feed run short, they have had to quit them. They went chiefly to export channels. Export 'of Ewe Lambs.

Behind this is the question of exportation of ewe lambs. When this year's sheep returns are available, it will be surprising if the Dominion flocks have stood the strain of the heavy exportation of the past two seasons. Some meddlesome politicians and other excitable persons have often advocated an export tax upon ewe lambs, but the remedy is not this way. It is another case where the immutable law of supply and demand may be left to rectify things. If a farmer can secure as good a price for a store lamb as for a freezer he is not likely to go to the trouble of fattening it. In the meantime the consumer's chop is likely to cost him more than ever. One of the privileges left to heads of householders is to pay, pay, pay. The world-wide shortage of meat is making itself felt in Canterbury. This year the exporters have handled third quality sheep owing to the strong Home demand for a cheap mutton. In the past these have all been "boned" for the tinned meat trade. This year considerable quantities have gone Home as ordinary frozen carcases. They will find their way to the tables of-, the poorer middle class people of the Old World to whom the better class colonial and Home killed meat is not available. Is the Trust Working.

The fact that two great meat packing firms, Swifts and Armours, are launching out in the Australian meat trade, naturally makes one ask .if they are making their influence felt in New Zealand. Persistent rumour,, which usually does not lie, states that the big American companies have buying agents throughout New Zealand. Colour is lent to this by the fact that two local firms have launched out, and purchased ands and thousands of sheep and lambs which would tend to give most people the impression that they are not working without an assured market. More sure thaii even the London market has been this season.

Whether or not the Trust is directly working in New Zealand hardly affects the question as much as the tremendous decrease in the production of meat throughout the world. The democratic sentiments of the Dominion electors would never permit any outside monopoly to seize the\supplies of New Zealand and use them to the detriment of the producer. The stake that farmers have hi-the freezing concerns will also militate against any undue influence being exerted by the Trust; The Butchers Waiting. "If the present prices of stock continue meat must go up by leaps and bounds," said one butcher to-day, when asked his position. "We cannot continue long as the prices are." He wound up by condemning the Trust, to whom he averred might be ascribed the present condition of the market. "When the Trust gets hold of the supply someone has to pay," he concluded. Another butcher in a large way of business agreed that the position was becoming intolerable, and that part of the rise in the market will have to be passed on unless the prices dropped considerably within the next week or two. '' We are waiting for a week or so to see how things go," he stated.