PRIMARY INDUSTRIES

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 48, 25 August 1931, Page 12

PRIMARY INDUSTRIES

FARM ECONOMICS TABLES

A MINE OF INFORMATION

''Evening I'ost," 25th August. The Farm Economics Section of the Department of Agriculture has just published an exhaustive statistical survey of all New Zealand primary industries. The land and uses to which it is put and live-stock production are fully dealt with in tabular form. Wool production and exports are dealt with in a special section. .Primary industry manufactures such as meat, bacon, and hams, soap and candle making, fertiliser production, butter and cheese and preserved milk, and flax milling also receive particular attention. Consumption, values, and volume of exports of primary products are also dealt with. Farm machinery and labour in use in primary industries are informatively tabulated. The latest year is 1929-30, and goes back t0!919-20 in respect to land and crop production. Live-stock production shows since 1901-02 a falling-oil in meat and wool, and a striking increase in butterfat production, the percentages being as follows:— 1001-02. 1929-30. I'cr cent. Per cent. Wool, mutton, lamb 07.U 46.0 Butterfat 10.7 3S.S Animal products 2.4 6.7 Live animals and byproducts 13.3 5.50 100 100 ' Increases in pig production arc noted. Butter-fat production has. grown from 43,526,000 pounds in 1001-02 to 314,068 000 pounds in 1929-30; and in the latter year 69.84 per cent, of the butterfat was used in butter and 23.02 per cent, in cheese. Estimated butterfat production per dairy cow has grown from 127.20 pounds in 1901-02 to 218.05 pound per cow in 1929-30, and the value of production per cow from £7.942 to £13.629 for the same period. Association cow testing is a comparatively recent practice, but it has grown in teu years from 3.6 per cent, to 19.7 per cent, of the total cows in milk and dry. The quantity of New Zealand-made butter and cheese consumed in the Dominion itself in 1929-30 was 20.5 per cent butter and 3.6 per cent, cheese, and the percentage of combined consumption of butter and cheese of the total made based on butterfat content was 14.6 per cent Consumption per capita has increased during the past ten years from 26.09 pounds of butter per head to 36.18 pounds per head for 1929-30, and cheese consumption 38 V| ry/mal!> amounting to 4.81 pounds The reasons for the low consumption TWth that m Great Britain may be found m the unsuitably of a meal of bread and cheese and tea, as compared with one of bread, cheese, and beer, the generally indifferent, or at least extremely variable, quality of New Zealand cheese placed on the local market, and—until recently—its Jiigh price compared with that for the graded produce retailed in the United ■tunguom. Wool consumed in New Zealand was 7™ on" Cent- of the quantity sold for ofa9G^^d! of 6 in^'m 8, "f 19293 0 pastoral J^ar 10,643,932 sheep and lambs were slaughtered, and of these 62.5 per cent, were lambs, and the exports for the same' period amounted to 3,035,848 cwts of such meat, together with 325.474 cwts of beef Hie beef exports were the smallest for the previous ten years. As a matter of fact, an IC2O-21 they amounted to 1.045,757c\vt of the value of £2.321.470, at the rate of 4.76 d per pound; and in 1922-23 to 834,280cwt, of the value of £1,003,804, at the rate of 2.58 d per pound. _ The highest average price for lamb was in 1924-25, namely 9.43 d per pound, and for 1929-30 the average was 7.32 d per pound. Mutton prices were fairly steady at between SMA and 4Hd over a period of eleven years, the highest being 5.87 d per pound in 1924-25, and the lowest 4.OSd pei pound in 1927-28, when lamb averaged 7.06 d per pound and beef 3.03 d per pound. The export trade in pork has a general tendency, to grow, but it has varied considerably since 1.921, from which year the returns begin. For the four years 1927 to 1930 inclusive, exports were fis under:— United Other Kingdom. Australia, countries. ,^» cwts- cwts- cwts. 1927 85.252 19,020 57 1928 138,513 17,100 106 1929 154,724 13,720 827 1930 142,451 1,530 184 . The effect of Australian Customs duties on pork and increasing Australian supplies explains the drop in last year's exports to that market. The effect of machinery on the farm-labour market can be seen in the following figures for the years 1919-20 and 1929-30:— 1920. 1930. F/lectrie motors 275 16 4.56 Tractors K24 s!s9l Intern, comb, engines 13.981 19,169 Milking machine plants 8,806 20.415 Separators 26.678 48.302 Cows in milk 707,351 1.368.287 Machine-milked cows 392,747 967,131 Per cent, machinemilked 51.2 70.7 The returns for 1920 are mainly estimates. Farm labour employed in 1919-20 has been reduced in agriculture aud pastoral industries, but increased in dairying; there has been a marked decrease in general labour on farms since that year. The total labour employed in all branches of husbandry has not kept pace with production, which has increased. The figures for all branches of farming compare as under: — Male. Female. Totals. 1919-20 99,685 32,504 132 249 1928-29 119,321 18,800 128121 Returns for 1929-30 are not yet available. Since 1019-20 to 1929-30 dairy production has enormously increased. Areas in cultivation have increased as to those in sown grasses, plantations, and fallow, but those an grain and pulse crops, green and root crops, and orchards and private gardens have decreased.