AUSTRALIAN BUTTER

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21399, 25 January 1933, Page 5

AUSTRALIAN BUTTER

RESTRICTION NOW LIFTED CLE Art IN G SURPLU S IN STORE SELLING POLICY REVIEWED ''' > > A decision to withhold 20 per cent, of the butter available for export to Great Britain was made toward the end of last year by tie Australian Dairy Produce Export Board, in view of the large quantities being shipped by all the exporting countries. The board has now decided to remove the restrictions and, commencing this week ; , one-tenth of the butter withheld will bo shipped weekly. This action has been iaken owing to a recent serious decline in production throughout the Commonwealth. - v

The board decided recently to restrict the sales of butter on an f.o.b. or c.i.f. basis, as it was considered that the action of certain firms in Australia in sellinj; butter at .'less than the. London market price for i'oirward delivery was detrimental to tho sab of Australian butter generally* A resolution was passed that, from March 1, the "sailing of butter f.o.b. and c.i.f* and e. to Great Britain be allowed only on butter previously entered for export and based on not less than London market values at the date of sale, according to the board's latest cable message; landing charges 1 per cent, commission and usual discount (2d in the pound) may be allowed, all sales on this basis to "be registered with the board." This decision has not passed unchallenged and butter merchants, and agents in Melbourne have formed an organisation known as the Victorian Dairy Produca Selling Agents to combat it. The organisation c.'aims that any unprejudiced examination of the London butter market' will sho'v that the factor in Australia; which in Suences it is the volume of production ind that the operations of forward sellers are of minor or of' no importance. /

NEW ZEALAND BUTTER

PRC CIF OF FOOD VALUE, BRITISH M.P.'S TESTIMONY m ' *• ' * ■ > *. " v [from our own correspondent] LONDON, Dec. 8' Mrs. SI. A. Ward, M.P., who recently in the Rouse of Commons proclaimed the excellence of New Zealand butter, writes to the Grocers' Review on the subject of dyed butter. ] ' "It will be a surprise to many people to learn," says Mrs. Ward, "from a written reply of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade to- a question asked in the House of Commons, that it is a common practice to dye foreign butter with annatta (a South American colis oui'ing isubstance). This, I understand, gives it the characteristic yellow colouring of Umpire butter, indicating a high vitamin-content. Nevertheless, there are apparently many people who still believe that because Empire butter is ' cheap it is inferior to certain foreign butter—a belief, I may add, totally contrary to my own conviction, bftsed on long usage of the Neiv Zealand product. "Housewives—especially those 'in the North ivlio have been brought up to regard piillidity as a virtue in. butter—> ought to know that the Empire Marketing Board's recommendations to buy Empire focdistufts are often backed by scientific authority. For example, Dr. Corry Mann, experimenting under the aegis of the Medical Research Council, proved that the addition of a very modest quantity of New Zealand butter to the food of, a number of boys greatly accelerated their growth: in height and weight in comparison with boys who did not have/the butter ration. • "The:i, again, an Empire Marketing Board publication on the researches of two eminent scientists clearly showed the relationship of the colour of certain Empire foodstuffs to their,nutritional value —a relationship reiterated by Professor DrummDnd, of London University, who, pointing out that the yellow butter yielded by cows fed on open pasture land is richer in vitamins than that from stallfed cows, urged the prohibition of the/ use of imitative dyes." .•