CLEAN AND PURE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 213, 9 September 1935, Page 5

CLEAN AND PURE.

AUCKLAND CITY MILK. ALL PRECAUTIONS TAKEN. FROM FARM TO DOORSTEP. Can the suburban housewife who takes in her milk from the door every morning feel with confidence that she is receiving an article that is clean and pure and that adequate precautions have been taken to ensure that this highly important food item has been produced and delivered under the best possible conditions ? According to officials of the Department of Agriculture, the Health Department and the Milk Council she can.

In an interview this morning Mr. W. T. Collins, district superintendent of the Department of Agriculture, said that one inspector was regularly engaged in doing nothing else but inspecting farms on which milk was produced for eale, while other officials made inspections from time totinie, including a -veterinary surgeon. Some 700 licensed properties were controlled by the Department, but many of those operated only in the summer holiday period. Cleanliness, said Mr. Collins, was strictly insisted on by the department's officials. An inspector visiting a farm where milk was produced for city supply would make a thorough inspection of the whole premises, paying special attention to such details as the tubes of milking machines, leg ropes, stools, cans, etc. Satisfactory drainage was also insisted upon, and all woodwork in the milking sheds had to be kept clean. A highly important branch of the department's work was the inspection of stock to ensure that only healthy cows were milked.

Power Over Licenses. If defects were found, added Mr. Collins, the producer could be ordered to make good the faults. If it though fit the department could either simply cancel a license or prosecute an offender. A prosecution, he said, automatically cancelled a producer's license. "Every precaution is taken to see that milk is produced only from healthy cows and under hygienic conditions," he declared. Once milk leaves the farm it comes under the control of the Health Department and the Auckland Metropolitan Milk Council. Here again every care is taken to see that all milk is of the high standard required by the regulations. At the present time the Health Department, with the assistance of the Milk Council, is taking some 50 samples of milk each week and subjecting each sample to the reductage test. In some {instances the milk is also subjected to a bacteriological test. All depots in which milk is stored are regularly inspected by the Milk Council's officials, and if these are not considered satisfactory a vendor's license may be cancelled. Vehicles used for the delivery of milk must- also comply with the council's standards. Only recently, for instance, a vendor whose cart lacked a floor board was ordered to make good the defect, the council's inspector pointing out the opening in the flooring of the cart would allow dust from the road to settle on the cans. Shops are also regularly inspected, and, of course, it is insisted that containers in which milk is delivered are perfectly clean. Milk Council Authority. It is not generally known that the Milk Council's inspectors have no authority on dairy farms. They can inspect the properties, but have no power to order improvements to be,carried out. That authority, in the case of a farmer producing for city supply, lies 6olely with the Department of Agriculture.