Likely to be more orders

Press, 20 July 1979, Page 9

Likely to be more orders

This photograph shows Merino rams being loaded dn board a stretched DCB at Harewo.od for the People’s Republic of China. The same aircraft also took some 500 in-lamb commercial Romney ewes and 50 stud Romney rams. Commenting on this part of the consignment Dalgety New Zealand’s stud stock manager, Mr A.

C. Watson, expressed the view that recent political changes in China had resulted in increased interest in agriculture and animal husbandry. The sheep industry in China was still very much in its infancy and the intention was to build up their sheep numbers, which would mean that increasing orders could come to New Zealand.

The Romney breed had been selected because the Chinese wished to buy sheep with good wool and meat yields to improve their native flocks. The sheep were also expected to perform well in the high rainfall areas of China. The Chinese buyers were well briefed in wool requirements but had something to learn about stockmanshin.

He found them to be extremely polite and straight forward in their dealings, but,, they never disclosed any real information about the future of the sheep or of the performance of previous shipments of New Zealand sheep. When asked for their opinion of these sheep their usual reply was “not half bad.”