Eel-worm cause of export ban

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32998, 18 August 1972, Page 8

Eel-worm cause of export ban

Press Association}

AUCKLAND, August 17. The export of potatoes to Noumea and of all produce to Tahiti from market gardens within a 10-mile radius of Pukekohe has been banned as a result of the appearance of eel-worm in two crops of potatoes.

This morning, export sections of Turners and Growers, Ltd, and Radley and Company. Ltd, had consignments of onions totalling 40 tons for Papeete booked on the Island trader Luhesand, now loading in Auckland. Advice was received from the port office of*the Department of Agriculture that a health certificate could not be issued for the onions. Without a health certificate the onions would not have been unloaded at Papeete and could well have been liable to dumping at sea. Both firms ‘ had onions either on the wharf or on trucks when notified of the ban. They were able to prevent most of the consignment from becoming subject to double handling. For Noumea, the ban applies only to potatoes. Today a small order of onions was shipped in the Capitaine Tasman. At this time of the year Papeete draws most of its vegetables from the United States, but later in the year the cabbage trade could be lost if the ban is still in force. A spokesman for the auctioneering firms said a cabbage ban would be a disaster, because 90 per cent of the export cabbages came from within the 10-mile radius under restriction, and the growers would have little chance of placing their produce elsewhere.