GUARANTEED DAIRY PRICES

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22775, 8 July 1937, Page 10

GUARANTEED DAIRY PRICES

The new dairying season will open officially 21 days hence, but the farmer still remains in the dark as to the prices on which he will be j expected to work. The Minister of j Agriculture promised an earlier I announcement than last vear, when ' the guarantee figures were withheld until August 4. So some of the advantages of certain knowledge in advance were lost. On the present occasion the farmer will have at the best to be content with short notice and must again accept the price the Government is pleased to offer. Against that there is no appeal and no remedy, except the farmer change over from dairying. Even that option is not left wide because of the delay in announcing the price. Farm production cannot be switched at short notice. The wheat grower, favoured in so many other ways, is favoured also in this; the price for his crop is announced a full year ahead. The dairy farmer is at least equally entitled to reasonable notice in advance. As it is, he has to make all his plans for the new season before he learns the price ; he has to make commitments in the dark. Under free marketing that was inevitably the case; the farmer had to take decisions on his estimate of future prices. The great advantage claimed for the guarantee was that it let him know where he stood on the income side, and so conferred a valuable measure of stability. But that advantage is being discounted with every day of delay in announcing the new season's prices. The cause of the delay is said to be the difficulty in determining the allowance to be made for increased production costs, an increase for which the Government's policy is chiefly responsible. Here as elsewhere Labour is piling up difficulties for itself to overcome.