Export Killing Season Month Away

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31167, 17 September 1966, Page 8

Export Killing Season Month Away

The opening of the new export lamb killing season is now only about a month away. The first works in Canterbury are likely to open on October 17. These are the Kaiapoi, two Belfast, Islington and Fairfield works. The two South Canterbury works normally open a little later but depending on the season and condition of lambs they might conceivably open about the same time as the other works. Picton is also likely to open around October 17.

The prospect is for a busy season. Ewe numbers in the province have risen markedly. Estimates given this week placed the increase on last season at slightly under 5 per cent to around 71 per cent The ewe flock is thought to be somewhere between 6.6 m and 7m at this stage. Lambing percentages also appear to have been heavier this season. The question is the affect that recent storm losses have had on these. The feeling is that the increased lambing percentages have not been entirely offset by these losses. After last season’s low ewe kill—it was down by about 400,000 head on the previous

season—the normal pattern would be for the kill of this class of stock to be up again this season. Can the works handle the extra stock that is likely to come to hand this season?

Mr R. D. Iles, general manager of the Canterbury Frozen Meat Company, said this week that the increased numbers might be an embarrassment as so far the freezing workers’ union had not agreed to any increase in the maximum daily tallies over last year.

Mr H. Cordery, assistant general manager of the New Zealand Refrigerating Company, said that they had the facilities to handle the increased stock subject only to

their being employed to full capacity. But the present state of negotiations over the killing quotas gave cause for criticism, he said. “We have already had negotiations with the men but they have not agreed to any increase. These negotiations will be renewed with the object of getting an increase in the kills.”

The secretary of the Canterbury, Marlborough, and Nelson Freezing Workers’ Union, Mr S. Arnst, said that there had been a meeting with the companies in the middle of last month when an increase in the daily kill for works in the Canterbury district from Kaiapoi to Pareora equivalent to 5350 had been sought. The companies had been notified that the union would look favourably on their request provided that they were agreeable to certain conditions.

Mr Arnst said that they had asked for a guaranteed 14 weeks’ term of full employment.

He had this week received a letter from the South Island Freezing Companies’ Association advising that the companies could not accept the union’s terms.

Mr Arnst said he would notify his executive of the companies’ decision.