THE WELLINGTON MEAT EXPORT COMPANY.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7448, 24 May 1911, Page 5

THE WELLINGTON MEAT EXPORT COMPANY.

ttirOM the little inland farms and the big seaward stations where the cattle are fattened, the wool grown, and the lambs “topped off” for the London markets, down to tho busy works of the Moat Export Company, sot in the narrow glen opening on the sea at Ngahauranga, is a far cry. But the company is the practical link between tho farmer with his little lot of fat weaners or his drove of prime steers, and the waiting markets on the other side of the world. It is one of the triumphs of modern methods that the small man, through tho travelling 'Tmyer,” has hia market brought to his door, and his price paid in his own “front room." They must have bought to good purpose too, these Meat Export people, for- something like five million sheep, half as many lambs, and one hundred thousand head of cattle have passed through the works. These are'the numbers exported. A mucli larger number have passed through the works, as many are used for cutting up for tinning and boilingclown, etc. Yet the business was only started in 1881. In that year they sent Homo their first shipment by sailing-ship—tho old-time wind-jammer, flying before the wind to-day, whistling for it to-morrow, and lucky to get through in a hundred days. In 1881, too, it was a sufficiently creditable record to put three hundred carcases through daily. To-day the big steamers, with their huge consignments of frozen meat, tinned meat, tallow, hides and pelts, make the run in forty days, while the Meat Export Company prepares the next cargo at the rate .of 6000 carcases daily, if necessary. Busy workers „ drawing wages all the time, sometimes as many as four hundred men at the works. Decent contributory, too, to the revenue of the Government railways,' whose annual bill runs into thousands. Such are the great businesses whose conduct builds up a great Dominion. _