“WHAT IS WRONG WITH NEW ZEALAND?”

New Zealand Mail, Issue 860, 24 August 1888, Page 1

“WHAT IS WRONG WITH NEW ZEALAND?”

Every day some industrious correspondent sends to the press a further item respecting New Zealand of a more and more disheartening character. Even colonists of twenty years’ standing, who have “made their pile ” and returned to the Mother Country, appear to be tolerably unanimous as to the fact that New Zealand is “on the downward grade.” Some assign one reason and some another, and in those statements, so far as they have come before us, there is ample evidence of extravagant expenditure, of mistaken speculation, of unremunerative outlay. But there is no evidence on which to base any predictions as t© the general decadence of the Colony, which t he pessimists just now would have us believe to be inevitable. A great deal of the present scare is due to the pessimist tendencies of the New Zealand press, whose “bearish” utterances from time to time play into the hands of people of their own views in this country. A contemporary yesterday calls attention to the fact that in March 2437 persons left the Colony as compared with 917 who landed in it during the month. But a decadence in London might be shown _ by the same method of abusing of statistics, for the persons who leave London are frequently vastly in excess of the persons who enter it during the day, and especially at certain seasons when there is said to be “nobody in town.” Without construing that too literally, it might easily be shown that the emigration in the autumn to Brighton, the Continent, and the moors comprised a far greater number than had entered London during the same period from all quarters and for all purposes, whether of trade or of pleasure. To the mere statistics of emigration and immigration in the absence of the necessary explanations we attach no importance whatsoever. But to corroborate this disheartening view the Otago Witness i 3 quoted in reference to the frozen meat trade, from which so much is anticipated in the gradual advancement of New Zealand, and the witness in question is a very doleful sort of witness, though it can hardly be charged with bearing false witness when it declares that the hock masters, after waiting 12 months for their money, have often received less than 5s per carcase of 621 b—that is, less than a Id a lb for mutton of prime quality. Incredible as it may appear, we have found on inquiry that this statement is not exaggerated. On the right-hand side of the roadway (Upper Thames-street), under the Charing Cross Railway, are enormous stores devoted to the frozen meat trade, and here we yesterday made some inquiries on this very interesting question. If the man who breeds the sheep gets less than Id per lb for it, the stages intervening between the flockmaster and the British consumer will surely pay for overhauling. We found, Messrs Nelson Brothers (Limited) occupying enormous premises, with storage chambers fitted up on the Haslam dry freezing plan, on either side of two corridors from Thamesstreet to the river edge—a distance of about 400 ft. The air in these stores is dried and reduced to 60 or 70 degrees below zero by means of two of Elaslam’s engines, which dry and refrigerate 60,000 cubic feet per hour, and one which performs the same duty on 70,000 cubic feet per hour. The dried and refrigerated atmosphere is conveyed through the series of chambers by means of a square trough, on the exterior of which—the doors of the chambers being now and then opened—the moisture in the exterior atmosphere thus admitted may be found condensed in the form of snow. Messrs Nelson Brothers have been in the business since 1885, and in these capacious premises they now store about 90,000 sheep and lambs, which, thanks to the efficacy of the process to which we have alluded, undergo no deterioration whatsoever from storage, but will preserve their firmness and flavour for an indefinite period. We were assured, also, that there is no truth whatever in the allegation that in the meat taken from these store's, decomposition sets in at an earlier period than in other cases. The fact is just the opposite. But prejudice is omnipotent, or nearly so, in this as in many other cases. We have sat down to dine with persons who, being tolerably fair judges of the quality of Southdown, have declared that if New Zealand could produce meat like that, her future would be glorious. But it was New Zealandmeat, and had they known

that fact, their eulogy would never have been uttered. It is this prejudice'alone that checks the demand, though the colonists themselves are sometimes not as careful as they ought to be. Take the lambs sent last month, for instance. They were too thin and poor, and only 32,000 were sent, as compared with 66,000 in the corresponding period of last year. But there is a steady and increasing demand, and prejudices must disappear where a fair and honest experiment is made. Although the stock in hand is not unduly increasing or unusually large, it is a curious calculation that in these vaults there is at any time enough beef, mutton, and lamb to feed every man, woman, and child in the metropolitan area for a couple of days or so. We have seen that the flockmaster gets Id per lb, or less ; then there is freight, freezing, storage, and profit to Nelson Bros., Limited, who sell it by the carcase to the butchers at 4ld per lb. What we pay the local butcher for it when delivered at our houses as Southdown leaves a sufficient margin to keep him from the Court of Bankruptcy, and to support his fast-trotting horses, with all those comforts by which, as a rule, we find him surrounded. When we are informed by Messrs Nelson Brothers that if the demand were such that the price paid to the flockmaster' could be raised from Id to 2d on 2)fd per lb, that would mean a high degree of prosperity, it seems worth while for those who are interested in New Zealand enterprise to discuss the best mode of effecting this object, and especially as it ought to be done without at all raising the price to the British consumer. Out of 232,917 cwt of frozen beef imported into this country in the fourmonths ending April 30th, 1887, New Zealand sent us 1501 cw t; and out of 243,940 cwt of mutton she sent 120,791 cwt. During the same period of 1888 she sent us 3673 cwt (as compared with 1501 in the previous year) of beef out of 263,599 (as compared with 232,917 in the previous year), and 163,503 cwt of mutton (as compared with 120,701 cwt in the previous year). The trade is therefore increasing, in spite of the prejudice and other obstacles, and will no doubt continue to increase, thereby contributing materially to the prosperity of the Colony, since whenever the agricultural class is prosperous the whole community flourishes, and vice versa. There ought to be no practical difficulty in the development of this trade so as to satisfy the modest demands of the flockmaster and cattle-rearer, who, but for it, would chiefly keep their flocks and herds for the sake of the wool and hides, and boil down the almost unsaleable carcases for their fat. With an increased demand and even a small lise of price, further efforts would be made to improve the breeds, not merely for the sake of wool and hides, but keep- : ing in view also the quality and flavour of the meat. If he must be regarded as a “ benefactor to his species ” who “ makes two blades of grass grow where only one grew before,” what compliment shall we pay the men who place in the London market this beef and mutton, of first quality, at the rate of half a million carcases iu the course cf a year ? But to-day we give statistics, and - reserve the complimentary business for a more convenient season.—The Financial Times (London), Bth June, 1888,