Levy Sought On Sale Of Fruit At Gates

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32383, 24 August 1970, Page 5

Levy Sought On Sale Of Fruit At Gates

(New Zealand Press Association) . TIMARU, August 21. New Zealand’s fruit retailers have threatened to boycott the Apple and Pear Board unless a levy was imposed on direct sales at the gate of fruit farms.

The president of the New Zealand Fruitgrowers’ Federation (Mr P. K. MeCliskie, of Nelson), said this in Timaru today. He said his information had come from the president of the New Zealand Fruit Retailers’ Association (Mr J. Lowe). Mr MeCliskie, who was addressing the annual conference of the Canterbury branch of the federation, said that of the fruit sold on the local market in New Zealand, more than 40 per cent was sold by the growers “at the gate,” and 60 per cent by the Apple and Pear Board. A marketing system was needed whereby all consumers paid the same for apples. The fruitgrowers’ representatives at the federation’s national conference in Wellington early next month would be asked to go back to their respective provincial associations and ask the growers to impose a levy on sales “at the gate.” Such a levy, he said, would unify the industry on a marketing basis. He said there had been criticism that pip fruits were not meeting the requirements of the general public. He did not think this was true, although the quality at times might not always measure up to requirements. “It has been said that pip fruit is too dear, but I deny this categorically,” he said.

The pip fruit industry would be affected if Britain entered the Common Market. “There is no use blissfully overlooking the seriousness of this,” he said.