MEAT TRADE

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume L, Issue 175, 25 October 1917, Page 5

MEAT TRADE

AMERICAN MEAT TRUST DANCER THEMEAT COMMITTEE'S REPORT. PRELIMINARY MEASURES URGED. (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) ■i. WELLINGTON, This, Day. Mr Lee laid before the.House the "report, of the Meat Export Trade Committee. ( ■:. TH© Meat Committee,, found that Armour and Co. (of Australasia), Ltd.. is a company registered in New Zealand eh ..American capital. It is financed! ami by J. Ogden Armour, of ■Chicago. ■ Armour and Coy. freeze in various works throughout New Zealand, packed' meat, in New Zealand. . Yestej Bros., of Great Britain and Chicago, control the following com- » pariies operating in> New Zealand: W. ami R. Fletcher, Ltd., Westfieki Freezing .'Coy., Ltd., and Whangarei Freezing iOoy., Ltd. It .had been suggested that Sims, •Cooper and Coy-., Ltd., were controlled by or assisted with American capital, but after taking evidence no proof of that had' been forthcoming.- It was found that in so far as buying in New Zealand was , concerned, the company had: financial support from local banking institutions. Some buyers ligiven prices for stock which could not •be justified in the view of the Government" Committee, the result being that several freezing works had suffered heavy losses, and.-pne had to close for part of last aeasoh. It was unsatisfactory and unfair to New Zealand producers, that —enormous' profits should have been made out of the sale of New Zealand released meat in [Britain. The 'system of giving rebates to. large buyers operated to -the detriment of small .buyers and tended to create monopolies. Small producers were prejudiced in the allotting of space to large buyers. In some countries the American Meat Trust had already established control of the meat trade. At first it inflated the prices of stock to kill competition and then, forced prices down below a fair market value, which reflected on the consumer io the shape of excessive prices.':..

Th© Committee made the following recommendations: — (1)' That legislation be at once passed giving the Goyernment power to make it;iilegal to grant concessions in consideration of exclusive dealing and; to control-:'or-'-prohibit special rebates. i(2) That, the Government promote legislation.. jsenfirally. . (a) To: controlmonopolies, {b) Prevent unfair trading by freezing companies or shipping companies. i(c) Provide for issuing licenses to freezing works and business of meat exporters. . (d) Ifeal with shipping companies as' common carriers... -(e) Mike the charges of such carriers "just reasonable. c,. {t) Prevent common carriers giving undue preference to persons or lo- >~ calities. ■■■ -' . (g) prohibit pooling of freights earn- ". v -in*rs.v ';-. {h) Provide' that common earners - shall print exhibit schedules of all rates .-charges. ■(3) .That the Government should forthwith consider a scheme for—(a) Controlling export of frozen meat after the -war, and '(B) in conjunction with Imperial Government distribution of. .meat in. (Britain... '_. .. - Note.—This- is necessary t° prevent '-exploitation of producer or cotfsumer-by meat trusts. -•: - ••=',■ (4) That effective measures should, $h tne interests of the [Britiih consumer, "be taken = by, the imperial. Government \o control • prices of released meat in Britain. ".""■■-■* • ;,-~ <5) That, the Government, either in the Home or„ New Zealand producer,- consumer,, importer or all of those parties, should establish' controlling interest in freights *nd shipping between New Zealand, and Great ■*,-,• (6) That, the Government should, in the interest of the small producer, and iri view of probable. Serious shortage of etorage. space,; take power ;tp - prevent large buyers,"from jhonopolising space in freezing works-during the -war. fT) That special care,be taken to see that foreign (firms, their agents and companies: registered in New Zealand *with a small capital which carry on large /businesses -by means of outside financial support, shall not escape taxation on the ground that-email, if any, profite are made on their trading in the Dominion, -provision . should be- made that such firms shall be taxed to an amount not less than is paid by New firms mot so financed or controlled. :•,.. . t Mr" Pearce said one very important fact had been established, and that was that the American trust, worked by American money, was [operating in the country. Armour. i and. Go., of Chicago, operated here with a capital og 4000 : £5 shares, 3997 of which, were held by J. O. Armour. But it had not -been shown that any of the operations usually associated with the American Meat "Trust wer« in vogue here. The American' Trust owned about 65 per cent-of the freezing works in the Argentine, where prime beef brought only £8 15s to £lO 10s, which was about half of what some beasts brought here. "He hoped the Government and the. Imperial Government would take immediate action -to prevent a similar _state of affairs here; Dealing with freights, he pointed ouC that it did not appear from existing conditions, that t the Imperial Government was looking, after New Zealand. It appeared to him that the large shipping, rings had a greater pull over the, Home Government; than people here knew of. Outward freights Had gone up £4 a ton in the last month. If something}- were not done in this matter, disaster would come over the country. Sir Joseph Ward stated that the report was a very important one. He had been called before the Committee to give evidence at his own request, because, he had heard that Mr Pearce (Patea) was trying to conect him with some of the trusts, which were operating Kere. He was opposed absolutely to trusts and combines of any kind whatever, and had never had anything to do ■with y.them. His company acted as managers for the .Ocean Beach Freezing Company, Southland, which was owned by the Federal Steamship Company of England, a purely British concern The works were for freezing purposes only, and did not buy or sell meat. Mi" Pearce. had worked round to endeavour; to him with the American Meat Trust. He Mr Pearce) bad collected newspaper cuttings from all over the place and deliberately set about! to attack iim: behind his back without even haying the -decency to acquaint ihim of the fact that.he was being atacked. It was perfectly wellinown that the efforts of the ; American Meat Trust to get into, this country were ;very dangerous. It was the duty of the.Government to, do everything. w its" power to protect fair : trade a.nd commerce. He did not believe the matter cpuld be solved in the manner suggested by several menjihej-s. There was

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fno power in the world to prevent anyAmerican meat concern coming to this country and operating, even if Government owned every freezing works in the country and had several shows in England, they could not stop the Americans operating. The whole controlling factors was the heef market. Even if Americans were out of the way it could not be imagined that there would not be active competition between the different works. In his opinion if large American companies eot a hold in this country, they would control prices. , At the outset prices would doubtless be high, but future growers would suffer. He would do all possible to keep Trusts and Combines out of the country. Mr Pe.arce by way of explanation, said he had imputed nothing to §ir Joseph Ward. Armours had advertised that they owned works in New Zealand and Burts of Australia had advertised that they were the agents for Armours and controlled the Ocean Beach Works. Sir Joseph Ward: That ia not correct. Burts do not own the works. Mr Massey stated that since the Government had taken over the control of meat, the value of frozen carcases disposed of was £18,515 683. On the matter of meat, what they had to do was to look to the future. That was where the danger lay. Taking a line through what had occurred in other countries, he mentioned that in the Argentine the Trust had taken control of the whole of the meat trade. Argentine cost the ' English Government less than Australian or New Zealand meat on account of the greater freights from here. In his opinion, freights from home were being increased by the English Government in order to discourage exports of goods urgently required at Home. When he was at Home the idea was started that alter the war, the Imperial Government and the' Dominion Governments would control the whple of the shipping and freight throughout the Empire. A Parliamentary Committee had been set up to go into the matter, and >e was sure that something of the kind mooted, would be consummated. The debate was adjourned another day.