IMPORTED MAIZE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 144714, 24 June 1915, Page 4

IMPORTED MAIZE.

SOME SERIOUS COMPLAINTS. vi:n p;iks3 association. AUCKLAND, Juno 23. Ino absence of arn’ Government regulations requiring the inspection of gram irapor-od into New Zealand is causing a good deal of dissatisfaction among produce merchants and others m Auckland at present, owing to the bad condition in which several recent shipments of maize have been landed. About 300 sacks of Fiji-grown maize which were landed by the'Union Company's steamer Atua this week aj'o the principal source of complaint. Ac- . cording to a statement made to a Star reporter by an expert this shipment is badly infected with the augllmois moth, a post which is rife in Fiji, and which is very likely to infect New Zealand crops unless something is done to stop its importation. Samples of grain shown to a reporter were full of holes made by the larva of tho moth, which tho expert stated was to bo seen in its fully developed siato on tho outside of the grain bags as they lay in the Harbour Board’s shed. Complaint has been made regarding shipments of- Australian maize recently landed by tho Kiwrina, Makura, and AVestralia. These, it is stated, cam© with weevils so badly that consignees would not take the grain into store, while the Dailway Department refused to convey it ir trucks, the weevils being extremely hard to get rid of once they are introduced into a store or any place where food is kept. Tho result appears to have been that the maize w-3 loft in the wharf sheds among all sorts of merchandise for a. week or more, during which time the weevils grow and multiplied, to the serious detriment of other produce stored in the building, Surprise was expressed by tho Star’s informant that tho Harbour Board should have given storage to grain in such a had condition, especially as merchandise of all kinds was kept in tho same sheds.