THE BOBBY CALF INDUSTRY

Southland Times, Issue 23254, 17 July 1937, Page 14

THE BOBBY CALF INDUSTRY

RATIONALIZATION PLANS CONTROL BY DAIRY FACTORIES In an interview on his company’s views on the rationalization of the bobby calf industry, Mr W. A. Phillips, chairman of directors of the New Zealand Co-operative Pig Marketing Association, Limited, stated, inter alia: — Over a year ago at the request of the Minister of Agriculture, the organization prepared a comprehensive scheme for his consideration. The fundamental principle of this scheme was the elimination of competition in the field, where its cost to the producer had increased out of all proportion to the service rendered, by transferring the real competitive element for the product itself from the field to the killing points, whence it could be capitalized to the producer’s advantage. This could be effected by the adoption I of the following basic proposals.— (1) Complete producer control from the farm gate to killing point. I (2) One collecting organization. j (3) The sale of the product, both at killing points in New Zealand and on consignment in Great Britain. (4) Allocation of killings at works, according to the percentage of their kill over the past one or two seasons, and geographical position regarding economic transport and distribution of live product to ensure prompt treatment with the greatest degree of efficiency from the viewpoint of works’ costs. The Minister of Agriculture recently announced that the industry would, before next season, be handed over to the Dairy Control Board, with the necessary statutory powers to deal with the position. It has been suggested by Mr A. J. Sinclair, secretary-manager of the Te Awamutu Dairy Company, that the field control could be undertaken by individual dairy companies, but this proposal would, in practice, be found unworkable without the daily co-ordination of all dairy companies in respect of the collection and distribution of the total live product over a wide area, which is only feasible by the adoption of one collecting organization, directed by the producers themselves. The machinery to carry such a scheme into effect would be the con-

cem of producers themselves, the nucleus of which, however, has already been established in the Government’s announcement previously referred to. In effect, it will be seen that these proposals would ensure to the producer all the real advantages of the present normal competitive element in the trade, without any of the present manifold and costly disadvantages of existing practices. Calves could be purchased on weight; collecting charges could be reduced to a minimum by organized zoning to ensure the fixing of weights on maximum loads; freight charges in the same manner would be improved; the freezing and export companies would get a square deal and, finally, because of the highly speculative character of the trade owing to the international aspect of the calf skin market, which mainly governs the price to the farmer, the means would be provided for a pooling scheme to ensure to him fair market value for his product at all times and under all circumstances. “In conclusion,” said Mr Phillips, “I consider it desirable to mention that the bobby calf trade is one, the ramifications of which are both extensive and complicated, hence any action at this stage, without a full knowledge of the situation, would be unwise and undesirable.”