CASE TIMBER

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26848, 12 August 1948, Page 4

CASE TIMBER

QUALITY CRITICISED

FRUITGROWERS’ CONFERENCE P.A. WELLINGTON, Aug. 11. Supply, specifications and the quality of cases for the fruit industry were discussed by the annual conference of the New Zealand Fruitgrowers’, Federation in Wellington yesterday. It was Stated that while some timber millers supplied case timber of excellent quality and cut* others were permitted to exploit growers by unloading, at the top price, “the most awful rubbish.” The need for correct specifications in case timber was stressed. The conference recommended that the Price Tribunal’s price order for payment for cases at auction marts be enforced, and that the regulations governing the collection and sale of second-hand cases be enforced, particularly to prevent market gardeners and others from using standard apple and pear cases to pack vegetables and other goods. The container charge should, it was felt, be brought more in line with the continer’s actual value.

A remit that only dry cases in shooks be supplied to growers was approved, and it was decided that all cases for next season should be delivered by March. Proposals rejected' by the conference recommended that the proposed export of pinus insignis timber to Australia be banned until millers had caught up with the supply of fruit cases, that the federation acquire land for the purpose of planting trees, and that a sawmill be set up in the near future for supplying case timber.