100,000 SACKS OF BARLEY

Press, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 23718, 17 August 1942, Page 4

100,000 SACKS OF BARLEY

IMPORTATION FROM AUSTRALIA

ARRANGEMENTS MADE BY MINISTER

(P.A.) AUCKLAND, August 16. Marketing problems were discussed in Australia by the Minister .of Marketing (the Hon. J. G. Barclay), who has returned from the Commonwealth. One outcome of his visit will be the importation of an additional 100,000 sacks of barley, from South Australia for fowl and pig food. . “New Zealand imported 41,000 cases of navel oranges this year, compared with 35,000 cases last year,” said Mr Barclay, “but the greatly increased local demand will make further shipments difficult to arrange." Mr Barclay added that there was not the remotest chance of the Dominion being able to import potatoes from Australia, where the position concerning this commodity was more acute than here.

SURPLUS OF OATS

UNSOLD

SOUTHLAND GROWERS CONCERNED SALE AT FIXED PRICE PROPOSED The complaint that 30,000 unsold sacks of oats, a dead loss to the growers, were piled up in Invercargill and the surrounding districts because of the policy of importing Australian barley for poultry and stock food " was made at a meeting of the Southland Council of. Primary Production last week,- and protests were made against the Government’s policy of urging farmers to grow oats without assuring them of a sale at a fixed price. A protest had already been made to the Internal Marketing Division, it was reported, against the importation of barley from Australia while there were still plenty of Dominion-grown oats, especially in the South Island, for sale as pou’try and stock feed. It had been urged that the importation be discontinued immediately until the Domin-ion-grown surplus had been absorbed, The Director-General of Agriculture (Mr A. H. Cockayne), replying by telegram to the protest, stated that negotiations were under wav with the_ internal Marketing Division. Repurchase all next season’s surplus first-grade milling bats at a fixed pries. The division was also considering the possibility of taking over the second-grade surplus at a price to be agreed upon, and if this was arranged the purchase oi the present-surplus would be considA ’member* of the council (Mr W. Carswell) said -that it was particularly necessary to have some such arrangement so that Sbtith Island farmers who had been urged to grow oats as a war effort would be, able to sen their stocks to the North Island when the milling demands were satisfied.