FRUITERERS DO NOT AGREE WITH GROWERS.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 134, 8 June 1931, Page 8

FRUITERERS DO NOT AGREE WITH GROWERS.

FARMERS SELL IN HIGHEST MARKET. Fruit wholesalers and retailers are critical of the efforts of Canterbury fruitgrowers to prevent Nelson apples being sold in Christchurch in competition with the local product. The principal ground for the criticism is that the local growers sell in the highest market, irrespective of whether it is Christchurch, Dunedin, or the North Island, and have, on occasion, it was stated, left the local market short in order to get better prices elsewhere. Air E. Freeman, chairman of the Canterbury Fruitgrowers’ Association, reported to a meeting of the association on Saturday that quantities of Nelson apples that have been rejected for export have been put on the auction market in Christchurch with a resultant adverse effect on local growers. Representatives of the association, he said, had discussed the matter with city auctioneers with a view to discouraging the sale of rejected fruit from other parts of New Zealand. Nelson fruit had paralysed the market. It was better to sell on the market than to shopkeepers direct, because competition was keener and prices were higher. A city fruiterer said this morning that not only reject apples came from Nelson. First grade fruit came from Nelson to the local market, just as local growers sent their fruit to the best market. The reject apples from Canterbury were also on the market in competition with the Nelson produce. It was stated that, when prices had been high in other centres, local growers had sent all their fruit away, the result being that the Christchurch market had, on occasions, been starved. Just recently, during the tomato season. local growers sent the whole of their crop away because prices were higher elsewhere, thus making the local market short of.supplies. In view of this, it was stated, there was no reason why Nelson growers should not send fruit to Christchurch, for, in doing so, they were following exactly the same course uu the local growers.