MARKETING DAIRY PRODUCE.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 7 February 1936, Page 3

MARKETING DAIRY PRODUCE.

WILL GOVERNMENT TAKE COMPLETE CONTROL?

WHAT WILL GUARANTEED PRICE BE? (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, Last Night. Another conference between Ministers of the Crown and members of the New Zealand Dairy Board was held at Parliament House to-day to discuss still further the proposals regarding local and overseas marketing of dairy produce and the Government's policy in respect of guaranteed prices.

After the conference the Prime Minister said: "We have not yet reached finality. The details of the Government's proposals are being shaped. At the present time a special committee is investigating the question and the application of guaranteed prices. As the matter will have to be discussed again at another meeting of the Dairy Board a detailed statement cannot be issued just now. There is no hitch in the negotiations. The whole matter is a question of detail." It was gathered from other sources, however, that the Government's proposals to the Dairy Board include, or at least involve, the determination by the Government to take over the marketing of: dairy produce, it being contended as a matter oil, logic that if prices are to be guaranteed by the State the control of marketing must be in the Government's hands. Ministerial confirmation of 1 his policy was not ascertainable in political circles to-day. As regards prices it is understood that according to the returns compiled by experts for the Dairy Board the average rates for butler and cheese during the past, ten years works out at a fraction over 13d per lb. for bulter-fat used in the manufacture of butter and a little more in respect of that for cheese-making.

11l the course of the general

election campaign some Labour candidates suggested the average return ovr the past JO years as the basis i'or fixing guaranteed.

prices, and it is understood that in the present official discussions Is 2d and Is 3d per lb. for butterfat have been mentioned, but nothing has been decided.