N.Z. FROZEN PEAS Australia Rejects Duty-free Entry

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31584, 23 January 1968, Page 1

N.Z. FROZEN PEAS Australia Rejects Duty-free Entry

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) SYDNEY, January 22. An application to import frozen peas duty-free from New Zealand to meet an expected shortage in Australia has been rejected by the Federal Department of Customs and Excise.

Mr F. Solomon, the importer who made the application t o bring in 250 tons of frozen peas from the Dominion, said today that New Zealand could sell at least 2000 tons of peas to Australia this year if they were allowed in free of duty.

“This makes a mockery of the free trade agreement,” Mr Solomon said today. “Unless the Australian Government changes its mind you may just as well tear up the agreement.” Another application made by a Victorian firm of food processers and understood to be for a much larger quantity than Mr Solomon’s 250 tons, is still being considered by the department in Canberra. Mr Solomon is managing director of Dobsons Foods (Aust.) Pty, Ltd, of Sydney, agents for two Blenheim food companies. Instant Foods (N.Z.), Ltd, and Dobsons Foods (N.Z.), Ltd. “Not Fair Deal” He said he would urge his supplier to ask the Minister for Overseas Trade (Mr Marshall) to take up the matter with the Australian Government. “New Zealand is not getting a fair deal in transTasman trade and it’s about time you put the boxing gloves on,” he said. Mr Solomon claimed that because of droughts in Queensland. New South Wales and Victoria, the Australian pea harvest would be down 35 million pounds this year.

“There will be a grave shortage and Australia will be forced to buy peas from overseas before the end of the year,” he said. Worst Drought Mr B. J. Somerville, general manager of the Frozen Food Company Proprietary, Ltd, Melbourne, which has also applied for duty-free entry of New Zealand peas, said: “We are in the middle of the worst drought we have ever had. Processers who rely entirely on Victorian-grown peas will get only 40 per cent of their requirements.”

The Department of Customs and Excise told Mr Solomon today that although there would be a shortage of supplies in some areas, harvest prospects on a national basis were such that approval of duty-free entry of peas would unfavourably affect the industry as a whole. Tasmanian Harvest It is believed that a good, if not bumper, harvest is expected from Tasmania, one of Australia’s major pea-grow-ing states. Observers believe Tasmanian growers would

have forcibly opposed the ap plication. Frozen peas and beans werv one of the most contentious items in the New Zealand-Aus-tralia Free Trade Agreement, and Tasmanian growers loudly attacked the Australian Government for allowing them to be included. Their opposition was such that New Zealand agreed that duties on frozen peas and beans should not be cut until the agreement had been in force a year. At present importers pay duty of 10c per lb plus 53 2/3 per cent of the f.o.b. price and exchange value on New Zealand frozen peas. This will not be cut again until January 1, 1969. Sliding Scale Trade sources claim that the sliding scale of duty is such that New Zealand exporters will not get any real benefit until 1973, when frozen peas will be admitted duty-free. There is no quota on New Zealand frozen peas at present but the duty prices them out of the Australian market under normal circumstances.