Japanese Want Dairy Import Ban Removed

Press, Issue 29236, 21 June 1960, Page 21

Japanese Want Dairy Import Ban Removed

LFrom the Tokyo Correspondent of “The Press’]

TOKYO, May 18. The . Japanese Government’s decision to allow milk producers and vendors in this country to raise the. price of milk by 15 per cent, has revived consumer

demands for cheaper imported dairy products.

This controversy iu a country of 90 million people which could consume more butter, cheese and milk powders than the United Kingdom and all New Zealand’s other overseas markets for dairy produce put together, should be of intense interest to New Zealand dairymen.

The price of milk in Tokyo now is the equivalent of lOd per pint. Then it is skimmed and watered. Full cream milk costs about Is a pint. Butter is 8s per lb. Cheese is also 8s per lb. A few special Danish and Dutch cheeses may be bought at exorbitant prices. Despite the high prices, more and more Japanese are changing from the traditional rice, fish, and vegetable diet to a more varied fare, including bread, butter, cheese and meats.

Protection of Industry The high prices of dairy produce are due solely to Government protection of a high-cost industry. The Japanese Government decided it was going to establish a dairy industry, barred or taxed the' imports out, subsidised the producers and let thdm charge what they wanted. The theory was that as the industry became established and expanded sales it would lower its costs and prices.

It has not worked out that way. The highly "planned” and “rationalised” industry had no competition either •at home or from abroad. Its growth in production and sales during the last 10 years has been paralleled by a growth in bureaucracy and restrictive practices. With the freedom to gouge the consumer it can raise its prices or restrict supplies at will New Zealand helped to establish the dairy industry in Japan. It sold stud Jersey heifers and sent a number of animal husbandry and grasslands experts to this country on loan through United Nations organisations. At the same time New Zealand dairy interests were trying to sell Japan milk powders, butter and cheese. They were almost successful at one point but. the burgeoning domestic industry and United States surplus dumping killed their chances. While New Zealand has shown its keen interest in the Japanese dairy market by protesting strongly against United States dumping the New Zealand Gov-

enunent has not always seen eye to eye with the’dairy interests, at least insofar as representations

here are concerned, on the protection issue. And protection is the real issue. United States surplus dumping is not allowed to interfere with domestic interests. If it did. it would be stopped tomorrow. N.Z. Leaders* Views It is interesting to note the different attitudes adopted by the leaders of the two political parties in New Zealand on this protection issue during their recent visits here. Mr Nash as Prime Minister and leader of the Labour Party representing labour and industrial protection interests, maintained a discreet silence on the subject of Japan’s protected dairy industry. Mr Holyoake, as leader of the National Party, a farmer himself and representing export and trading interests, was outspoken on the subject and made at least one strong suggestion that Japan could well consider what New Zealand had to offer in the way of cheap butter, cheese and milk powders. Freer Trade Unlikely The chances of breaking down Japan’s import restrictions on dairy produce in the near future, if ever, are slim. A protected industry once established becomes a vested interest and a powerful lobby in the Government. That its interests—high prices and the right to a part of the nation’s resources—may not be the best interests of the people or the country as a whole does not matter. So long as it can cry unemployment—of people who should never have been employed by it in the first place—bankruptcy and loss of face for the “experts” who thought it up in the first place, it is safe. Thus Japanese children will never get the amount, of milk and butter they need and the New Zealand dairymen must resign themselves to another closed market, all because of the theory that it Is better to wear homespun and curdle your own milk than buy a better product from your neighbour.