The Evening Star TUESDAY, JANUARY 10, 1928. THE PORK SUBSIDY.

Evening Star, Issue 19760, 10 January 1928, Page 6

The Evening Star TUESDAY, JANUARY 10, 1928. THE PORK SUBSIDY.

It is most gratifying to sec tho determined opposition to the proposed Government subsidy on the export ol pork. In Otago at any rate .there are even some dairy farmers, who raise pigs as a side line, with more of a sneer than a smile on their faces when the subject is mentioned. “Quite all right ” was the comment of one ol them, “ so long as it is tho pig breeders who will get tlie money. But they won't.” Asked who would benefit, tue farmer ran over a short list of firms bettor known in the North than in the South Island, and said the whole business was so transparent that he wondered the Government had the audacity to foist it on the people. The principle is vicious, and it is impossible to ignore the fact that those interested in other exports are certain to regard this subsidy as a precedent, and sooner or later similar treatment will bo demanded for honey, flax, tallow, and other commodities which take the risks of tho world’s markets. A correspondent of the Wellington ‘Post’ asks: “What happened last year in regard to export of pork? Tho public, which will have to make good the loss on that trade, should know. The average ■ price offered by bacon curers in New Zealand was, I have been informed, 5d to 5Jd per lb at country stations. This was not considered good enough, so some TaranakiManawatu farmers shipped Home, and took the risk of the market. They lost by this venture, realising an average of 4d per lb; and some of them who had scorned 5d locally netted by exporting. They took a gambler’s risk and lost. Is the subsidy to help make that loss good?” An astute business man, with large interests in bacon curing and export, who happened to be visiting Wellington during tho holidays, said he would have nothing but approval for any wellconsidered effort tho Government might make to encourage the dairy farmers to raise pigs suitable for export. Hitherto, he said, any movement in this respect had been confined to private enterprise, and the farmers in general had only just begun to realise they were raising numbers of pigs quite unsuitable for the Home market. In his own experience farmers who took their pigs as seriously as tho best of them took their milking cows had no difficulty in getting rid of their pork. It was in active demand, indeed, and gave good returns to both producers and curcrs. The Government’s subsidy, in the judgment of this authority, was not required by tho men who were raising the right sort of pigs, and was not deserved by those who, through sheer ignorance of the business, were raising the wrong sort. There is another mistake which has been made, according to a Dunedin business man who knows this trade, both at the New Zealand end and at 'the European and British end, as intimately as any one man can know any subject. That mistake has been the curing of the carcass in New Zealand. Tho proper method, he says, is to take out the backbone, leaving the ribs, to freeze tho carcass, pack each half of it separately in suitable cases, and leave it to the British curers to do the rest. They know the peculiarities of tho demand in tho different districts of Britain, for what the population of one town would rush the population of another town would scorn. Above all, the possibility of antagonising the trade at Home, which is really dominated by powerful Canadian and United States interests, must be avoided at all costs, and pursuance of present methods of exporting pork from New Zealand is said to be the very way to court this antagonism. What happened when absolute control by the New Zealand Dairy Export Control Board in respect of butter and cheese should not be forgotten. British firms boycotted New Zealand shipments and invested large sums in the Argentine and elsewhere to ensure supplies so that the market gUould not feel the shortage that would

arise from the retention of New Zealand dairy produce in coo! store. There is one other important aspect. If the Government persists in granting this pork subsidy, it should probe intimately the existing conditions in the trade, from sty to breakfast table. The difference between what the breeder gets for his pigs and what the housewife pays for her ham, bacon, and fresh pork is too pronounced to be explained away by ordinary trading profits. The existence of buyers’ rings in the stockyards of New Zealand—this phenomenon is said to flourish more luxuriantly at Burnside than elsewhere —has been bitterly complained of by breeders and fatteners. During the recess a conscientious Minister of Agriculture could amass quite a lot of very interesting information in this domain of trade.