SOUTH AMERICAN MEAT TRADE.

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 17, 21 January 1927, Page 11

SOUTH AMERICAN MEAT TRADE.

The; New Zealand Meat Producers' Board has received a letter from it» 8o«ih American representative, dated 19th N3vember, from which the following «x----tracts are taken:—

"There is an exceptionally large available supply of fat cattle owing to the favourable conditions and the lesser quantity required by the freezing companies. Values have in consequence declined considerably, and many of the large feeders of steers are finding much difficulty in getting rid of their fat cattle before they attain overweight when they have to be sold at whatever price can be obtained, and then the freezers do not want much beef. With a large offering of fat cheep, principally lampß, on the local market values are considerably weaker all round, and buyers state that a large proportion of the lambs arriving in the market are lacking in condition. "The prices paid by the freezing companies are as follows:—Chiller*, 2.29 d, 2.48 d per lb live weight put in the plant; heavy chillers, 1.74 d, 2.02 d; English freezers, 2.11 d; Continental;-I.B*l, 2.02 d; Italian, 1.84 d, 2.02 d; cannerg, 1.56 d, 1.84 d. Sheep: Wethers (in wool)-,' 4.64 d, 4.84 d per lb dead weight; shorn wethers, 3.63 d, 4.04 d; ewes (in wool), 4.04 d,, 4.64 d; shorn ewes, 3.23 d, 3.43 d; lambs, 6.26 d, 6.66 d. Exchange: £1 sterling, 11.89 dollars. - "Shipments of frozen; lambs and also some lots of beef have been sent to the United States, where there are good proßEecta of an outlet, especially if the duty c' removed, to encourage shipments to that enormous country with ita increasing population and insufficiency of meat raised in its own territory. It may be some years before, the United States imports, any appreciable .quantity jof this country's meat, but it appears to me as if the great Northern Republic will be glad to get a share of this country's Earplug meat, which at the present time is more than the British and Continental markets are apparently able to absorb."