BUTTER SUPPLIES.

Press, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20630, 20 August 1932, Page 7

BUTTER SUPPLIES.

DUTY ON FOREIGN PRODUCE FACTS FOR CONSUMERS. (from oue otfk coanßsrosDwrr.) LONDON, July 15. Mr J. Gillard( Staplcton, Chairman of the Butter Sectipn, Empire Dairy Council, has a reply to the statements Hse recently by the Bt. Hon.. A. W. Alexander regarding foreign butter. The statement appears as a letter to the' ''Morning Post." Ho writes:— Proposals, put forward by British farmers and endorsed by the leading organisations of Homo and' Overseas Empire producers to prevent threatened excessive importation of foreign butter this season have been subjected to bitter criticism by those who profess to ; speak for consumers, and I should, therefore, like -to put the essential facts before the housewives of the country. . It is complained that the restriction of foreign imports will lead to dear butter, and one critic, an ex-Socialist Cabinet Minister and leader of the Co- i operative movement, has gone so far as to describe as a-"butter ramp threat" the very reasonable suggestion that foreign butter shall be subject -to a j duty by weight of 20s per cwt. j The reason why butter tq-day is as cheap as in pre-war days, notwithstanding the big increase in production costs, 1 is the tremendous increase in production both within and without the Empire. The remarkable achievement of the New Zealand and Australian farmers in increasing their output by 68 per cent, in three years would, if a corresponding amount of .foreign butter had been displaced, have added enormously to the exchange ftf trade between * the Homeland and the Dominions; but because foreign surpluses have also arrived in increased quantities, these Empire producers were in 3931 paid an average price of 35 per cent. Jess than in 1929, and their j capacity to buy Britisli manufactured i goods has been enormously reduced. I- am sure that the thinking bouso- j wife must realise that when food is j sold without profit to the producer the time is not far distant when production will fall and prices will soar to famine heights. Remembering that during the period of the collapse of butter prices purchases of Britisli goods by Australia. New Zealand, and Canada have dropped ■ by 5S per cent., the housewife, I feel certain, will prefer to pay an honest f price rather than have butter at lOd a j 111 and an unemployed husband. j