MARKETING OF PRODUCE

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27097, 21 July 1953, Page 3

MARKETING OF PRODUCE

STATEMENT BY GROWERS’ PRESIDENT

“Given satisfactory conditions, the growers in and near Christchurch can and do supply the produce markets with reasonably priced fruit and vegetables, but they have no control over their produce after it is on the: auction floor,” said Mr A. H. Wood, the president of the Christchurch Stone Fruit and Tomato Growers’ Association, in a statement to “The Press” yesterday. Mr W. Morrison, the president of the Canterbury Retail Fruiterers* Association, had stated in a report published in “The Press” that the price of containers was passed on to the consumer for as many as twenty times, said Mr Wood.

If that was so, the grower who bought the vegetable case from the retailer in the first instance, also paid for it every time it was used, so where was the charge to pass on? The grower also had to have in his yard huge quantities of the containers when his crop was ready to harvest. „ “As regards the grading being faulty, the fair packing regulations are there to safeguard the purchaser,” said Mr Wood. “A grower would not be in business very long if he resorted to unfair packing.

“The concern for the loss of good market gardening land is a real one, but the loss of growers from the industry will be a much greater one if the low prices that have prevailed for the last few months continue much longer,” concluded Mr Wood.