EMPIRE PRODUCTION

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 150, 28 June 1938, Page 17

EMPIRE PRODUCTION

THE BRITISH MARKET SYDNEY CONFERENCE A SCOTSMAN'S REPORT (From "The Post's" Representative.) LONDON, May 25. The sharing-out of the British food market by the agricultural producers of Great Britain and of the Empire on the basis of the Ottawa principle (1) home produce, (2) Empire produce, (3) foreign, was the main question examined at the recent Sydney conference of Empire producers. The Scottish delegate to that conference, Mr. James Picken, past president of the National Farmers' Union of Scotland, reported upon the proceedings to the central executive of that body in Edinburgh on May 19. It was revealed that Empire producers are strongly opposed to any levy upon imports of their produce. The meeting made a spirited appeal to the Government to deal with "the desperate plight of the sheep industry" due to the slump in prices. It was asserted that first-quality Scottish mutton on the London market is cheaper today than for forty years, yet consumers, it was alleged, are receiving no benefit from this primary cheapness. Prices quoted showed that home mutton iyas 31s per cwt lower in price in April than it was in April of last year, yet imported lamb was Is per cwt higher than in April of last year. New Zealand lamb was put at lid per lb below the price of first-quality home mutton. SHARING OF MARKET. Mr. P. D. Robertson, Castlecraig, Nigg, asked if Empire producers were not seeking development of markets for their produce in the United States in return for the motor-cars bought from that source. Mr. Wilson, Kirkmabreck, Creetown, said that the Government would have to investigate the trading devices under which their farmers were suffering from overseas competition. Mr. Pottie,| Nairn, stated that New Zealand farmer-friends had asked him the same question as was put to Mr. Picken out there—why our costs of production were so much higher. Mr. J. W. Alexander, Moffat, asked if it was the case that New Zealand j today had not the lambs to fill the I quota on this market that she was j granted. ' ' Mr. Picken, in reply, said that practically every car he saw in Australasia) was from the United States or Canada, j There were no imports of complete cars. He was told that there was a growing trade for Dominion produce in the United States and Canada, but they could not give him figures. As regards their opposition to a levysubsidy on imports arriving in our market, the Dominion farmers had no alternative. They would prefer that the British market should take all their produce, even at a reduced price. They say it is up to the Home Government to find ways and means of subsidising the home farmer if his market was flooded. DAIRYING IN NEW ZEALAND. Mr. Picken said that during two days' visit to New Zealand he saw in the North Island early winter grass with the cows out on pasture and with no hand-feeding. A herd of 60 to 80 cows was run by two persons, a woman and a boy. All that was required was milking, done by machinery, with a pipe-line right l into the separator, and with the skim-milk going down another pipe to the piggeries, and the cream dispatched to the factory for buttermaking. In two out of four herds visited they had great trouble with mastitis. A. number of farms in that area were going out of milk production; they were sickened with losses from mastitis. He was told also that mutton producers were going through a crisis, many sheep having a disease known as facial eczema. Sheep were being killed by the thousands at the factories and were being boiled down and canned, as they were unsuitable to ship as carcasses. The sheep farmers had similar trouble before and got over it. But this was the worst experience of that trouble. On the motion of Mr. W. K. Leggat, Yonderton, Turriff, a vote of thanks to Mr. Picken for his report was passed.