NOTE AND COMMENT

New Zealand Mail, 21 February 1901, Page 51

NOTE AND COMMENT

The feeling which has existed in England for some considerable time against the use of preservatives in butter is sure to be accentuated by the recent fatal results attending the adulteration of beer. More than once it has been pointed out that the movement against adulteration is not so much against the adulteration of any particular article, such as butter, but it is aimed at the common adulteration of almost every perishale article of food, which means that the Englis i consumer, and the London citizen in particular, is forced unknowingly to consume constantly chemical agents of a very powerful* nature, which in time must have a very pernicious effect upon his system and in upon the general well-being of the nation. True it is that butter is able to retain its flavour for a greater length of time-by

the aid of preservatives, but there is every reason to believe —in fact the konwledge is certain—that- if the deleterious aeteria, which the preservative is able to counteract, is prevented from entering the milk, the need for the counteractant disappears. It is the old story—prevention is better than cure. Little effort is made to prevent the trouble, but every means is taken to invent means by which either an antagonistic agent (a preservative) is introduced into the butter, or its composition is altered (by pasteurisation) in the endeavour to kill the harmful bacteria. Making, as v/e are, for the most critical market in the world, it behoves us to remove every defect from our system of manufacture and turn out the purest article which is possible, and we cannot make a pure article unless we have a pure raw product to manufacture it from.