DAIRY MARKETING.

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XLIII, Issue 13176, 7 February 1936, Page 5

DAIRY MARKETING.

WILL GOVERNMENT TAKE CONTROL. PARTIES NOW CONFERRING. Electric Telegraph;—Press Association WELLIXOTON, East Night. Another conference between Ministers of the Crown and members of the New Zealand Dairy Board was held at Parliament Douse to-day to discuss still further the proposals regarding local and overseas marketing of dairy produce and the . Government’s policy in respect of \ Sii#aranteed prices. After the conference the Prime Minister said: “We have not yet reached finality. The details of the Government's proposals are being shaped. At the present time a special committee is investigating the question and the application of guaranteed prices. As the matter will have to be discussed again at another meeting of the Dairy Board a detailed statement cannot be issued just now. There is no hitch in the negotiations. The w’hole matter is a question of detail.” It was gathered from other sources, however, that the Government’s proposals to the Dairy Board include, or at least involve, the determination by the Government to take over the marketing of dairy produce, it being contended as a matter of logic that if prices are to be guaranteed by the State the Control of marketing must be in the Government’s hands. Ministerial confirmation of this policy was not ascertainable in political circles to-day. As regards prices it is understood that according to the returns compiled by experts for the Dairy Board the average rates for butter and cheese during the past ten years works out at a fraction over 13d per Jl> for butter-fat used in the manufacture of butter and a little more in res]>ect of that for cheesemaking. In the course of the general election campaign some Labour candidates suggested the average return over the past lO years as the basis for fixing guaranteed prices, and it is understood that in the present official discussions Is 2d and Is 3d per lb for butter-fat have been mentioned, but nothing lias been decided.