FRUIT-CANNING.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1746, 23 August 1905, Page 61

FRUIT-CANNING.

NEW ZEALAND AND CALIFORNIAN. TESTED BY EXPERTS. There was a gathering at the Agricultural Museum on the 15th inst., of about forty persons connected with the fruit industry in New Zealand, the occasion being the testing of samples of fruit canned in New Zealand as against fruit canned in California. Besides a number of gentlemen connected with the wholesale houses and packing companies in the city, there were present Mr E. Basil Jones, manager of the Frimley Canning Factory/Hastings; Mr Johns, president of the Auckland Fruitgrowers' Association, and Mr _S. Kirkpatrick, of the well-known fruit-preserv-ing firm at Nelson. Mr T. W. Kirk, Government Biologist* explained that as there was a good deal of second-grade Californian fruit on the New Zealand market, people were apt to run away with the idea that that was the best California could produce. There were samples on view, however, obtained in London, where the best of the Californian product was sent. Mr W. Jaques, the canning expert, had fifty-six samples of canned fruits from different New Zealand and Californian factories displayed on a table, and invited the gathering to examine and sample them, and write their judgments on voting papers, which would he kept by the department for his guidance. It would he unfair, he said, is. the present infant state of the industry, to declare anything in favour of any particular packers in New Zealand. All he had called them together for was to let them see what was don© in. California, and what was already being done in New Zealand, and allow them to deduct from the comparison their own conclusions as to the possibilities of the industry in this colony. There were about a dozen New Zealand packers represented in the exhibits. ... About an hour was spent m examining and testing the at the conclusion of which the departmental officials thanked the experts for their attendance, and expressed the hope that the gathering Avould be for the good of tho industry. Several of the visitors expressed their pleasure at the display, and the prospects of fruit canning in New Zealand.