MARKETING OF WOOL

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21984, 20 June 1933, Page 8

MARKETING OF WOOL

PROPOSED CONTROL BOARD STRONGLY OPPOSED BY BROKERS (Per Uniteu Pbess Association.) WELLINGTON, June 19. The Wool Brokers’ Association issues an official statement bearing on discussions in the press regarding a Wool Control Board, and the standardisation of grades, and binning. “ It is desirable,” the statement says, «that the views of the'association should be made known, so that farmers during the period of hard times may not be induced to take any false step. The interests of the farmers and the brokers are identical, but the brokers do not desire to see Government interference or a Board of Control creep into a business that is now efficiently conducted. It is recognised the world over that the system of marketing wool here and in Australia is the best in the world. This was also recognised at the Empire Wool Conference in Melbourne in 1931, when growers were present from Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand.” The statement says that the industry can control itself, and the business acumen of brokers, buyers, growers, and financiers does not leave room for any board, however composed, to interfere with advantage to the grower. The law of supply and demand, and the worldwide competition which is obtainable through the means of the wool_ sales here and in London, determine in the only business, practical and economic way the price which the grower gets. « In regard to binning, there is a point which should be made quite clear: Wool is not on all fours with butter, meat, or ffiemp. It is difficult to conceive how butter could be marketed except through the factories, and, so far as meat is concerned, unless sheep are sold upon the hoof, they must be graded before being paid for. The grading of hemp has never been too satisfactory, owing to the personal equation and the fact that the growth of the fibre varies in various districts, just as wool in the Dominion differs in growth, staple, and chaiacter in the different provinces. This in itself would render the standardisation of wool grades in New Zealand a difficult problem. , , “In all these cases the number of n-rades involved is a bagatelle. In the case of wool it is different. The Bawra scheme in Australia had 840 grades; and some New Zealand centres require grades running to several hundreds. It is pointed out that, in contrast with butter, all -wool has some value, and finds a market according to quality. There are buyers for all lots, whether well or indifferently classed, skirted, or unskirted. To bin or not to bin is a question to be dealt with from day to day on the merits, and the brokers give free and impartial advice to the grower. Binning, therefore, should be left to the discretion of the farmer and the grower. Regarding the suggestion that, if some compulsion were used to bin small clips, it would give the brokers a larger quantity of wool to work upon, and enable them to make larger parcels, this doubtless would be the case, but it is introducing a bad principle, and using a sledge-hammer to break a nut. Compulsory binning would he obnoxious, and anathema to most business men, and to the farmers themselves. The report concludes by saying that the brokers would strongly object to Government officials being employed in their stores, and anything that savours of Government interference would meet with the strongest opposition.