FROZEN PRODUCE LETTER

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17324, 25 May 1918, Page 8

FROZEN PRODUCE LETTER

! MORE FROZEN MEAT AVAILABLE. STORAGE STOCKS. | — (From Ode Special Cobbespondent.) i , LONDON, March 19. , A change has come over the meat market , Rather more than a month ago frozen moat ; pitchings on Smithfield: well under 40 per cent, of the total supplies. This last week I r 7J! ere no , ar ! y P er cent-- 3385 tons out ; of 4244 tons being imported meat, and comi prising the followinglmported beef and ' veal, 2227 tons; Australian mutton 581 ; tons; other mutton, 341 tons; pork' and i bacon, 46 tons; poultry, etc., 190 tons. The [ total marketing shows a rise of nearly 300 tons on the previous week; 800 tons on a month ago, and a decrease on a year ago of 1500 tons. It may be added as regards ! supplies that the position is expected from now onwards to get easier, and frozen meat ; will doubtless figure more strongly than it has done of late. Recent marketings have included excellent frozen beef from Canada > Brazil, and South Africa. ' SMITHFIELD IN FEBRUARY. ! Supplies at the London Central Markets , during February aggregated 14,752 tons made up as follows:—Beef, 9636 tons; mutton, 5374 tons; pork, 365 tons; poultry and game, 594 tons; rabbits, 166 tons: butter, cheeso, and margarine, 156 tons; eggs, 306 tons; sundries', 455 tons. When compared with February, 1917 deliveries show a decline of S7Ol tons, or 37.1 per cent. Decreases occur in beef' 963 tons; mutton, 4664- tons; Dork, 2826 tonspoultry aud game, 493 tons; rabbits, 201 tons; butter, cheese, and margarine, 184 tons; while eggs and sundries show increases of 176 tons and 454 tons respectively. Sundries comprise .most of the items usually stoclvcd m a grocery warehouse Vital meat supplies—beef, mutton, and pork —for the month were equivalent to a ration of 14.60z P?r head per week for a population of 8,000,000, as against 22.80z per nead in February, 1917. GOLD STORAGE. Mr Clynes, the Parliamentary Secretary of the Ministry of Food, stated in the House of Commons on the 21st ult that stocks of meat of all kinds held in oold sreoresand in importers' warehouses in the United Kingdom on January 1 were 14 per cent, more than in January last year The increase, Mr Clynes added, is entirely due to items held for consumption by the army. Ihe Food Controller has now appointed a successor to Mr J. Wardle, who resigned tho directorship of Cold Storage recently The new director is Mr A. J. Brickwelf chief surveyor of the Great Northern Rail! way. The Cold Storage Department of the Ministry of Food is engaged in helping tfirough several now cold storage undertakings 111 different parts of the country, but by the year-end perhaps not more than a quarter of the present total cold storasre capacity of the United Kingdom will have been put up —namely, an additional 8,000.000 cubic feet. As a matter of fact, at the present time, the cold stores of the country are. us a whole, about half empty. This should not be. as available food reserve:; are the great desideratum. THE WAR AND MEAT COMPANIES. Sir Montague Nelson, presiding at the annual meeting in London of Messrs Nelson Bros. (Ltd.), made some cogent remarks concerning the current position of the frozen meat trade. He said that the reduction in the dividend was doe, in the first place, to the fact that very little profit had been made on the works in New Zealand. The Government had bought all the meat there, and all the comply had to do was to freeze it and holcl it until the Government shipped it. TTiev could not keep working at full blast or anything like it, because the stores were full and were only relieved at long intervals. Iho oompany was totally' free from the charge of " profiteering." Although they were not making much money for themselves, they were doinc the best they could for the Government By the way, Eastmans (Ltd.). of the greet multiple frozen meat retail ship companies in Great Britain, h.os done better in the past year Its profit in 1916 had (dwindled to the lowest for more than 10*yc-ars and stood at £44,703. Now it is £81 237 for 1917, which permits of a 5 per cent, ordinary dividend, as against nothing t o t the previous three yean.