A FROZEN MEAT TRADE FOR QUEENSLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 1905, 14 August 1890, Page 7

A FROZEN MEAT TRADE FOR QUEENSLAND.

(From Oub Melbourne CobbbßP(>hdbnt.) Sir Thomas M'llwraith has apparently been profoundly impressed during his summer excursion in New Zealand with the importance of the frozen meat trade. He is at the front of the strong movement in progress to establish it in Queensland. A. meeting was held in Melbourne last week to support the movement, whioh was of a very influential character. The principal speech was made by Mr John Cooke, general manager here of the New Zealand Loan and Mercantile Agency Company (formerly of Christchurch). Mr Cooke, in the course of his remarks, eaid be bad been connected with the frozen meat industry in New Zealand from its inception, and that was his one excuse for addressing the meeting at length on the snbjeot. A slight correction was required in the New Zealand figures as given by the chairman. Up to the 30tb June 1| millions of sheep and lambs had been exported out of a total quantity of 15 or 16 millions. Ten per cent, ot the produce had gone out in a frozen state. The importance of this to New Zealand could hardly be realised here. He would say with confidence that the success of the frozen meat trade had carried New Zealand through her financial troubles, if it had not saved the colony from actual bankruptcy. It had put a permanent value upon every acre of land in the colony. If the meat export trade ceased in. New Zealand tomorrow, it would be a blow second only to the lobs of tbe wool trade. It was of as much importance there as eilver was

here, but more reliable and regular. . What sold at 3£d per lb now would, he believed, yield s<l per lb in a few years to come. If the grower could get l£d per lb or 7s for a 561b wether at the Queensland works, and 3s 6d for the skin and tallow, it would be a profitable trade. From the works here to tbe butchers' hands in England would cost from l£d to l|d per lb ; so that at 3d or 3|d in England the trade would b" profitable. In average years they could rely upon 3d per lb in England, and in addition to the immediate profit f here was a benefit in many other respects. He believed this meeting would mark the boundary between frozen meat as a clumsy experiment and as a prosperous and permanent industry. It is somewhat hard to say what Mr Cooke meant by this last remark, Frozen meat is surely no longer a clumsy experiment in New Zealand.