AUCKLAND WOOL SALES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20229, 13 April 1929, Page 10

AUCKLAND WOOL SALES.

With the close of another season for wool sales, those people in Auckland who are concerned in the disposal of the provincial clip have again voiced the need for more consideration in the allocation of auction dates. This is not, a new question. It was raised some time back when a wet spring, delaying shearing, resulted in a reduced offering at, the November sale, and a heavy accumulation of wool which more than filled the catalogue for the subsequent auction. Farmers, in addition, were kept waiting for their wool cheques much longer than was convenient for them. Those circumstances are liable to occur again at any time in the future. The size of the clip from the province has been increasing not only rapidly but regularly. It is obviously a process that will continue, for the figures for provincial flocks, especially those for breeding ewes, show that sheepfarming is a growing industry. Yet those in whose hands lies the power of allotting sales and arranging dates are slow in recognising the facts. If sheep-farmers are forced to send wool to another centre for earlier selling than is possible in Auckland, business is diverted from its natural course, and, what is more serious economically, heavier freight charges than should be incurred have to be paid in many instances. The position, no doubt, is as has been stated by a leading woolbvoker. Starting a long way behind other parts of New Zealand, Auckland is finding it difficult to secure recognition as n serious factor in wool production. It was, as has been pointed out, the same with dairying. Taranaki was proverbially the butter province of the Dominion for many years, until the logic of figures that could not be escaped showed how Auckland, having forced ahead, was continuing to increase the lead. The province is still very far from equalling Hawke's Lav or Wellington in flocks or output of wool, but the growth in both of them demands that the application for more consideration over wool sales shall no longer be politely but firmly ignored.