N.Z. PIG EXPORTS

Hawera Star, Volume LII, 28 January 1933, Page 7

N.Z. PIG EXPORTS

INCREASE DURING SLUMP EFFECT OF LOW BUTTER-FAT PRICES Commenting on the export figures for frozen meat for the first three months of the present season. Mr Phillips, chairman of directors of tlie New Zealand Co-op. Pig Marketing Association Ltd., said that it was grathymg to note that whilst exports of ail other meats had, compared with the same period last year, suffered a substantial drop, the export of pigs had materially increased, the actual increase being over 10,C0> carcases. Up to December. his company had, tins season, exported on behalf oi its suppliers, over 20,000 pigs, and now held m store for shipment within the next three weeks an additional 13,000 carcases. Some idea of the response by farmers in the Auckland Province, Hawke’s Lay, the -uanawatu and Taranaki districts, to this movement may be judged by the fact that for the same period a Ist year its exports were less than 50,C00 carcases. Although the production of pigs lias always been a profitable adjunct to dairying, it is only in recent months, since the collapse of tlie butter market, that farmers seem to have realised the real value of the pig in supplementing their returns tor butter-fat, said Mr. Phillips. The extent to which these returns may be augmented by the conversion of skim to pig meat must always very largely depend on management, but- under good conditions it has been amply demonstrated that at ruling export values for pork, it is possible to add from ltd to 2d per .pound to butterfat cheques. With butterfat at its present low level the pig is therefore a gentleman to be respected, and it is hoped that out of tlie present unfortunate situation of the butter market there wili emerge a wider and truer appreciation of the importance of the pig as an inseparable and indispensibie corollary to the economic production of butterfat.