‘Poor wheat reason for bad bread’

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34149, 10 May 1976, Page 7

‘Poor wheat reason for bad bread’

Parts of an editorial in “The Press” on wheat and the quality of bread were based on inaccurate information, the director of the Association of Bakers (Mr R. J. Hicken) has said.

The comment that “given slightly different weather the quality of the flour produced from wheat grown in New Zealand this year would have been satisfactory’’ was not completely accurate. The weather had been only one factor, and not the most significant factor, in the quality of the flour produced, said Mr Hickin.

The marked fall in quality has been brought about by the large quantity of lowquality Karamu wheat grown this year. It was a new variety, introduced in 1974, and had not lived up to quality expectations.

Last year, 49 per cent of the wheat produced was the Aotea variety. This year Aotea. which had an average baking score of 36.0. was only 1.7 points below last year’s quality, but it made up only 15 per cent of the total crop. Karamu comprised 36 per cent of the crop this year, but it had the very low average baking score of 31.0, said Mr Hickin. These figures, taken from a Wheat Research Institute report on March 18. indicated the marked effect of Karamu in substantially reducing the over-all quality of this year's harvest.

“You also comment that ’it is probably true that few customers noticed any serious deterioration in the quality of their bread’. This may well be the case in Christchurch but it is not so in many other areas, particularly in the North Island.

“It is generally recognised that South Island mills are able to select the best of the wheat produced, being close to the main areas in which it is grown. The rest, if any, goes to the North Island.” Consequently there was a difference between the North Island and South Island wheat available to mills and the quality of flour produced from it, he said. Consumers in the North Island and in some parts of

the South Island had certainly found a deterioration in the quality of their bread. Many had complained to bakers and quite a number had written to newspapers expressing dissatisfaction that bread had been smaller in size than usual, had become stale rapidly, and had a brittle crumb which caused it to disintegrate when sliced, said Mr Hickin. “This is surely more than a ‘slightly lower quality of bread’ which you suggest consumers should bear with until next year.

“Another comment you made was that, ‘Even if the deterioration becomes noticeable, this is still not a good enough reason to spend overseas funds on importing wheat.’ “You overlook that the cost of importing high-protein

wheat will be offset very l substantially by revenue from i exports of wheat not required in New Zealand either because it is surplus in any case to the quantity needed here, or is of low quality. “Some bakers may, as you suggest, be concerned at the effect on their livelihood of any drop in sales as a result of having to use poor quality flour in their bread.

“However, in making its! request for importation of] high-protein wheat to blend with low quality local wheat, the New Zealand Association of Bakers has been concerned, as all bakers are, to ensure that consumers do not have to continue to put up with the difficulties they have been encountering from time to time in many parts of the country because of poor quality flour.”