Meat Board negotiates 100,000-tonne sales

Press, 14 June 1983, Page 2

Meat Board negotiates 100,000-tonne sales

NZPA staff correspondent London The New Zealand Meat Board has negotiated sales of more than 100,000 tonnes of mutton and lamb in recent weeks, its chairman, Mr Adam Begg, announced in London yesterday.

Sales have been to a range of markets, including the Soviet Union, he said, but some countries had asked the board not to disclose details of the contracts and it was complying with their requests. Shipments, all from the present season’s production, would begin within the next few weeks and would be completed by the end of November, Mr Begg said.

The contracts would not be at the expense of Britain or other E.E.C. markets, he said.

Mr Begg said that a lower volume would be exported to Britain in the present season as he had forecast last November.

“We have not altered the volume objectives I gave eight months ago to phase shipments to Britain to match the requirements of the market,” he said.

Mr Begg said that he was optimistic about stock levels

in Britain being reduced to typical quantities by the end of December if sales continued at traditional levels.

“Our volume purchasing research shows that sales since the beginning of this year to June 4, were almost 12 per cent higher than during the comparable period in 1982.”

Mr Begg said that there was a consistency of wholesale prices in Britain since the board assumed ownership of all New Zealand lamb in October, 1982, with the agreement of New Zealand exporters. This had played a crucial

role in stabilising the market after a period of violently fluctuating prices during recent seasons. Board ownership had also helped to sustain confidence in the commercial future of New Zealand lamb in Britain.

“Buyers have been able to purchase only as much volume as their immediate needs require,” he said. News of the contracts, and the progress achieved in .selling a higher volume in Britain, flatly contradicted the uninformed comment made in recent months criticising the management of meat exports by the board, Mr Begg said.

“The board and its staff have demonstrated its ability to handle the marketing of New Zealand meat in the face of extreme pressures in the international marketplace during the last six months,” he said.

“Insofar as Britain is concerned, this result is due in no small measure to the autonomy given to our London office to set prices and establish a relationship with our sub-agents which is developing into a sound commercial partnership.” The president of the

National Federation of Meat Traders, Mr Mike Richardson, told its annual conference in Harrogate at the week-end, that the federation’s executive would continue to object to the late marketing of New Zealand new-season lamb this year.

It feared that the total control of marketing New Zealand lamb now exercised by the board must be against the federation’s long term interest.

“Many of us believe that the carry-over this year was a direct result of the board’s interference in the market early last (northern) summer and that interference has resulted in New Zealand lamb being considerably cheaper now than it was last year,” he said. Mr Richardson asked: “Has not anyone told them that the first loss is always the best loss?”

Noting that the agreement for New Zealand access to the British market was coming up for review, he said that the federation would work with the New Zealand Meat Board “to lend our weight to the arguments that there should be no disturbance in supplies.”