Greece big market for N.Z. lamb

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32706, 8 September 1971, Page 19

Greece big market for N.Z. lamb

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, September 7. Greece might become New Zealand’s second largest lamb market, the European director of the Meat Board (Mr D. L. H. Marton) told a meeting in Athens, the board reported yesterday.

Mr Martin said that in 1962 only four tons of New Zealand lamb, was sold in Greece. A year later the board exhibited New Zealand lamb at the Thessalonika Fair for the first time because it thought Greece offered a potential market “Time has shown that we were absolutely right in our thinking,” Mr Martin said. “In the year after the board’s first exhibition in Greece 2500 tons of New Zealand lamb was imported and sold here, and by 1969 exports of New Zealand lamb to Greece had grown to 6900 tons.

“In 1969 we again exhibited and sold New Zealand lamb at the Thessalonika Fair, and sales to Greece have continued to flourish so well that New Zealand exporters have stated that their probable sales in 1971 will be about 14,000 tons, which would

make Greece the second largest market for our international lamb. | “This is rapid progress,

and to assist future sales the board has recently appointed a travelling representative in Greece,” Mr Martin said.