DISQUIETING REVELATIONS.

Waipa Post, Volume I, Issue 3, 25 April 1911, Page 4

DISQUIETING REVELATIONS.

AUSTRALIAN BUTTER DETERIORATING.

According to Sydney files containing reports of the Royal Agricultural Show, the butter exhibits were of a lower grade than in previous years. "There were fewer entries," says the "Telegraph," "but,the best and most progressive factories in the State were represented. The decline in quality may be assessed at about 4 to 5 per cent. This is a very serious matter from every point of view, and. one that needs

looking into closely by the manufacturers. . . . The best test of the quality of the. season's butter, from the export point of view, is afforded by the continuous judging competition, in which 19 of the foremost factories competed. As this butter is taken each month from the agents' floors, it may be regarded as a fair sample of the butters that go to London. Of 151 samples judged during the eight months' currency of the competition only seven reached superfine standard, ■while the general average of the whole was but 85.6, showing that these butters collectively for the eight months could only be classod as second grade. Mr Stening, who judged the butter this year and last year, was asked to discuss the quality of this < year's exhibits. Mr Stening, in his interview, said that the deterioration applied to both qualit}' and manufacture. After going into details concerning what he regarded as the errors which were the cause* of the falling off, he said that the chief conclusion forced upon him by the exhibits was that the manufacturers for the most part had shown no resource. They had followed the system of normal seasons, instead of adobting methods to counteract. the effects of abnormal conditions. Had this been done, there was no i reason, in his opinion, why the butters should not have been up to the standard. • • '