LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 122, 16 February 1921, Page 8

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

MEAT PRICES Sir, —Like your correspondent. "One of Thein," I, too, have remarked an the unbusinesslike way in which the High Commissioner’s cablegrams are placed before the reading public here, and have come to the conclusion that his information is obtained from London buyers and speculators who naturally don’t want us to know too much and succeed admirably. Hi is not so long ago since buyers here, who evidently had some one in authority by the ear, found fault with the precise information as to London prices supplied by Sir Thomas Mackenzie, and you may remember, Sir that his produce cablegrams were promptly suppressed and only restored when an appeal was made to Mr. Massey on his return. The information supplied to you by a representative of the freezing companies that their prices are regulated by tho maximum wholesale prices fixed by the Food Commissioner in the United' Kingdom, which are Is. Id. per lb. for lamb, 9d. for wether mutton, end Bd. for ewe mutton, may te so, but it must not be forgotten that hi’s control is about to expire and that most of the meat now being slaughtered here and purchased at 9Jd. for lamb, with skin and fat and gut and all other accessories now possessing a cash value, and dear only knows how little for the train-loads of wether and ew« mutton I see passing to the abattoirs, will be sold in the open market in competition with Home-killed meat, ths price of which is impressed upon the heart of every farmer by these Home cablegrams: TJamb, 2s. 2d. per lb. wholesale; mutton, Is. 7d. per lb. wholesale; beef. Is. 7d. per lb. wholesale, all bv itie carcass only. Farmers here will therefore see that there will be a wide disparity between the value in tendon of home-slaughtered and New Zealand frozen meat, when the Food Controller relinquishes his iron hand, and I do hope that lire bulk of t'he sheep now being slaughtered are conveyed for sale to London or elsewhere on farmers’ own' account and not quitted at the ridiculously low prices I see quoted in the North Island. Can any one, even the dullest of farmer-, be surprised that the c.i.f. demand, at controlled prices, as quoted by your frozen meat friend, is keen at the moment? The objection to lamb tegs has teen the stock-in-trade blandishment of the sheep buyer for years, but I have noticed that he never could keep his eye off the lamb over 421 b. in tho sheep yards, and carefully rejected the primest ot lambs, weighing 301 b. or under. It now turns out that the same piffle is being urged to underrate the value of sheep carcasses over 601 b., and much the same practices will be observed. The remedy for all this fault-finding is. in the farmer’s own hands, viz., tb ship all he produces on his own account, and although totally disinterested. I’ll venture to suggest that even with present high prices for handling and transportation, as quoted by the frozen meat expert, he never will regret it. Sir George Clifford, to his everlasting credit be it said, has steadfastly set his face against these meat trusts in our midst, and encouraged the farmer to do his own marketing, through the company he has so successfully directed all these veais, and companies, both north and south, as well as banks and stock and station agents, are willing and many even anxious to accept this class of busi-

ness. , , , , The movements of the tendon market after Afarch 31 may be uncertain, but buyers of all descriptions of produce, wool included, are fortifying themselves by the widest of wide margins, and there is therefore provision made for a drop in price, with the prospects of very large profits. .... Have you noticed, Sir, that m your Yorkshire letter published yesterday Sir Arthur Goldfinch’s opinion, as to the ultimate outturn of Australian wool is clearly set forth, and that they are entitled to a release free of charge of no less 900,000 bales of old wool, but hot a word, is said about the release of any New Zealand wool? Does not this imply that ■someone is needed to look carefully into the position of New Zealand wool in London, and one naturally wonders why the appointment so strongly supported by the farmers is hung, like the sword of Damocles, between heaven and earth. ~A.TaDLY PERPLEXED FARMER. February 15, 1921.