Wool Delay ‘Should Not Be Tolerated’

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31871, 26 December 1968, Page 10

Wool Delay ‘Should Not Be Tolerated’

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, December 25. Delays in implementing the recommendations of the Wool Marketing Committee should not be tolerated, said the president of Auckland Federated Farmers (Mr W. R. Martin).

He said the 1967 report of 1 the wool marketing study! group had been approved by) the committee headed by Sir) John Acland as a reasonable! system of appraisal and mar ) keting, but a year had elapsed [ since the suggestions had) been made. “Although the Wool Marketing Committee has decided that the system is sound, it cannot be put into practice for some considerable time. The committee has given reasons for the delay. “An appraisal and marketing system is urgently needed to stabilise the wool industry —both from the woolgrowers’ and the manufacturers’ points of view,” Mr Martin said.

He said wool must be put on a stable basis for quality and price to enable it to compete with other fibres. The delay in starting a new system only improved the competitive position of other fibres. Stockpiled wool should not be given preferential treatment under an improved system but should be on the same basis as new season’s wool. A reference to the present delicately balanced market was “just a bogy man introduced to scare woolgrowers into maintaining the present disorderly marketing system,” he said.