Favourable Prospects For The Lamb Export Season

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19100, 22 August 1936, Page 13

Favourable Prospects For The Lamb Export Season

THE coming lamb export season should be a. favourable one. both in respect to the number available and for price.

The Gisborne district, along with others in the Dominion, is experiencing very good lambing, expected to be the best for many years, and if the market remains favourable the farmers of the district should have one of the besf seasons for a long time.

Interest ing comment on the position as it concerns Canterbury is made in tho annual review of Messrs. l.'yno, Gould and Guinness, Limited, Christchurch, and circumstances there appear to be much on a. par with those of the Gisborne district this season. The review states:— , More Ewes For Mating "We believe that rather more ewes will have been mated this year as there has been an upward tendency in each recent year and the interim sheep returns suggest that it has been continued. Further, the big decrease in the number of ewes killed points in the same direction and, as we point out above, there are also signs thai in the South Island at any rale more ewe lambs have been held than usual. "In 1935 New Zealand shipped fewer lambs than during the two previous years, though more than in 1932. Australia, on the other hand, shipped a record number. South America again shows the result; of flu; Ottawa restrictions. Largely as a result of the increased shipments from Australia, the total exports to tho Home markets Avert- very nearly up to the record figures of 19.'!.".. It should be noted that, ■whereas in tite five years ending 1930 Australian shipments only represented 27 per cent of New Zealand shipments, in 1935 they represented 55 per cent; Australia is still making progress in the direction of overtaking New Zealand. The Future

"The future of the meat trade, wo expect, will depend on the balance between political and economic factors, and it is therefore very difficult to forecast. There does, however, seem to 1)6 reasonable hope that. Great Britain will be able to absorb all the lambs avc are likely to produce in the near future, and that the point, has not yet been reached where probable restrictions will have a definite limiting effect on our export quantities. There seems no more reason to predict a decrease in the value of our meat, in the Home markets next, year than there is to predict an increase, and we think Hie best advice Ave can give our friends is the advice we have repeated so often, that quality remains of paramount importance in the fight to retain our supremacy, and Ave are glad that so many of the things Ave have written above seem to indicate that wo arc still retaining that supremacy. "The province is well situated as regards Avinter feed at the time of writing, and subject to the Unforeseen, the lambing ought, to be good and the stage set for an increased crop of lambs for 1037 of the very highest quality. As Ave understand the quota figures, there is still room for a modest, increase in the quantity of lambs than can be sent to the Homo markets."