DAIRY EXPORTS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 113, 9 November 1933, Page 13

DAIRY EXPORTS

MARKETING QUESTION

PRODUCERS AND BOARD

REPLY TO MR. BRASH

(By Telegraph.—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, This Day. A reply to the statement by the secretary of the Dairy Board (Mr. Brash) was made today by the.New Zealand Dairy Producers' Tree Marketing Association. . ■ The association l-einarks that Mr. Brash's statement is a belated re'eognition that some explanation is due to the producers and the public on this vitally important matter. The statement would make it appear that the new marketing scheme originated' with the Importers'. Association. The'truth was that the Dairy Board, through its chairman (Mr. lorn's) was responsible for it. After quoting cables in support of this assertion, the association says: "The board has used all its efforts in placating the Importers' Association instead of putting itself on side with the producers, and ,Mr. Brash's statement gives no explanation of what specific measures of control and what regulations the board proposes to apply. Opposition to the scheme has been steadily growing at the London end. The only portion of the trade consulted was the Tooley Street importers." x Large important buyers on whom New Zealand depended were 'as bitterly opposed to this . semi-control as they were to the absolute control of 1926-27, says the. association. Mr. lorns told the Importers' Association in London that there would be no price fixation, but now the board proposed to take power to fix prices in regard to f.o.b. and c.i.f. sales. This feature alone would seriously harm the industry.- Mr. Brash's statement that f.o.b. and e.i.f. sales would be made possible was unacceptable because the inevitable result of price fixation would be the elimination or drastic curtainment of such sales

"Why," asks the association, "is the Dairy Board proceeding exactly as it; did in 1926-27 in seeking ; - drastic powers and all the time assuring.the producers that these powers are harmless, and will only T>e used in certain modified ways? When control was instituted in 1926-27 it was done under powers which the board had repeatedly protested it had no intention of using. Is history to repeat itself?" The association declares that Mr. Brash's claim that the board has a mandate from the producers is an utter farce. The companies when they appointed delegates to the.conference of September 20 had no hint that they would bo asked to endorse radical alterations in the marketing methods. The proposals were rushed through, and the board did not disclose the many protests it had received. . \