SLIGHT RISE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 266, 9 November 1932, Page 7

SLIGHT RISE.

PRICES OF MEAT.

MARKET CHAOTIC.

Increase of |d Per Pound All Round. PROBLEM OF COLD STORES. (Unlted-P.A.— Electric Telegraph—Copyright) . ■- (Received 12.30 p.m.) LONDON, November 8. Though forward selling was improved by the Ottawa agreement 'of a limit to imports, Smithfield market was thrown into an erratic condition owing to the uncertainty of how the stocks in cold storage would be handled. These, as Major Elliot hinted in the House of Commons, may prove a more difficult problem than the new imports. At present the stocke in cold store ineftide 750,000 carcases of New Zealand sheep, 350,000 of Australian, and a smaller quantity of Patagonianl It is expected that the agreements will improve the prices of Australian shipments arriving in Decemher and January, which are usually Australia's worst months. Later advices state that after the early uncertainty the prices of mutton and lamb at Smithfield rose Jd all round. New Zealand and Australian importers are forming a committee to study the effect of the restrictions on the markets in order to avoid undue disorganisation. Mr. S. M. Bruce spent the greater part of the day conferring with the meat interests o ? this question, and Mr.. K. S. Foreyth, Chairman of the New Zealand Meat Producers' Board,. is also cooperating. Desperate Straits of Fanning. In announcing the Government's emergency proposals for the restriction of meat imports Major Elliot in the House of Commons, said that the Government had been deeply impressed by the desperate straits of the farming industry, and emphasised the importance of agriculture as an employing and wealth producing industry. National recognition of- the need for saving agriculture was explained in the smooth acceptance of what amounted to a fiscal revolution. If agricultural prices were good, people and capital would flock to the land. The problem of the industry was that of the price level. In recognition of this the Government had begun with a wheat quota and a horticultural duty, and was continuing other steps to help other branches of the industry. Meat had been reserved until after the Ottawa Conference, but the conditions in the livestock industry had rapidly become worse. Emergency measures were necessary to limit the supplies, which from all sources must be restricted, and that meant proceedings by negotiations with all foreign countries with whom Britain made or hoped to make commercial agreements. The arrangements for the restrictions, he said, were to run experimentally for the next two months and ought to nut a bottom into the meat market.