FIJI BANANA CROP

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28606, 7 June 1958, Page 14

FIJI BANANA CROP

Communique On

Talks

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, June 6.

An assurance that the Government would do all it could—taking into account its overall exchange position, the interests of other traditional suppliers, and New Zealand’s obligations to its own island territories—to ensure that licences were made available for the importation of a reasonable quantity of Fijian bananas was given today by the Minister of Customs (Mr Boord) to the visiting Fijian delegation. The delegation led by Mr W. H. Davidson, Financial Secretary to the Government of Fiji, expressed its gratitude for the action of the New Zealand Government in authorising sufficient import licences to cover all the Fiji bananas likely to be available for export this year. The Fijian and New Zealand delegations met yesterday and today to discuss Fiji’s banana trade with New Zealand. A communique issued today outlined the growth of the industry in Fiji and said any severe limitation on the entry of bananas to New Zealand would . mean that both the Colony’s trade balance and its internal finances would suffer. Any curtailment of exports would fall on the people who were least able to bear it.