CHEESE MARKET

Hokitika Guardian, 25 June 1935, Page 8

CHEESE MARKET

CAUSE OF LOW PRICES LONDON, June 21. In the House of Commons, Sir Percy Harris asked why the wholesale price of English factory cheese recently had been from 4s to 6s less per cwt than the best imported New Zealand cheese. Mr Elliot, Minister for Agriculture, made an admission, which in Sir Percy Harris’ view should convince the Home farmers that the Dominion producer is not, as has been asserted on so many occasions, undercutting Die British dairy market. “The present margin in price,” said Air Elliot, “would appear to be influenced by the reduced imports from New Zealand in the first quarter o» 1935, coupled with an accumulation o. stocks of home-produced cheese. 1 ' In a letter to various newspapers, Sir Percy Harris now writes: “New Zealand, which supplies m wit,h about 70 per cent of our imported cliese, reduced her exports to this country by 108,000ewt., or 15 per cent during the first quarter of this year, and the price of her product has i remained fairly stable at an average oi 47s a cwt. At same time, the price of English factory cheese lias declined since the beginning of the year from an average of 45s to an average of 40s per cwt. “If anyone is underselling the Home market it is, therefore, not the Dominion producer. I suggest that any policy of quotas or levies on Empire cheese cannot remedy the present unsatisfactory position of the Home factory cheese-maker. His recourse in the first instance is, surely, to improve and popularise his produea, and so secure to it the goodwill and price premium that attaches to other food produets of Home manufacture. No artificial bolstering up will permanently secure to a third-rate product a firstclass price, much less increase the public demand for it.”