Butter Price Drop May Cost N.Z. £20m A Year

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28178, 17 January 1957, Page 10

Butter Price Drop May Cost N.Z. £20m A Year

(New Zealand Press association) WHAKATANE, January 16. New Zealand should aim at reducing costs within the dairy industry, said Mr I. B. Gow, of Edgecumbe, a member of the New Zealand Dairy Board, today.

“We may not be able to do a great deal to make the British housewife take larger quantities of our produce at high prices, but we should, as a people, do all that lies within our power to pare our costs,” he said.

“For some time now the first concern of the dairy industry’s leaders has been the question of costs. The need to set the national house in order is very real.

"The United Kingdom market today appears to be the dumping ground for all producing countries which have surplus butter to sell.” said Mr Gow. "The combined effect has been to make that market, normally capable of taking about 300,000 tons annually, absorb almost an additional 100,000 tons.” he said.

It was, too, a new thing for the United States to be an exporter of butter in any quantity, but she

! had, during the last year, ex- ; ported over 100,000 tons. The fall in the price of New I Zealand butter could hardly be : called anything but serious, said Mr Gow. After being quoted at i 403 s per cwt (ex-store U.K.) in | November, 1955, just over a year :ago, it had fallen to the low price iof 260 s last week. "I am aware that this is quoting a peak price against what could i probably be regarded as a ‘trough’ ; level of price,” Mr Gow said ("But if this is a permanent low i level it will mean a loss of over--seas earnings of some £2O million a year.” • Last year, 139,000 tons of butter was sold to the United Kingdom.