THE DANGER OF FOREIGN COMPETITION

Waipa Post, Volume XXIV, Issue 1681, 3 November 1925, Page 2

THE DANGER OF FOREIGN COMPETITION

NEW ZEALAND SEEN AS A COMPETITOR

There are certain facts concerning the dairy trade, viewed as a world movement, Avhich those engaged in the industry in the United Kingdom will do well to consider very seriously, says this writer. The most vital of them is this: that the rapid development of means of transport and communication, of refrigerating methods, and so on, has now made it abundantly clear that no policy can succeed which regards the industry solely from the national standpoint. A few facts will give point to this view. How many members of the dairy trade realise that the transport of dairy products across the Equator is a development of the past forty years? Yet so it is. Australian butter was first landed in England in good condition in 1881, and this successful application of mechanical refrigeration in the oversea transport of butter gradually opened the markets of the Northern Hemisphere to the products of the extensive pasture lands of New Zealand, Australia, Argentine, and South Africa, and thus placed the dairy produce market on a world basis. Let us consider the special case of the United Kingdom, which is the principal international market for cfairy products, as it absorbs much more butte,r and cheese than all the other countries in the world taken together. In 1903 (only 22 years ago, be it noted), 85 per cent, of the total imports of butter into the United Kingdom came from Europe; only 14 per cent, came from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, and the United States combined. In 1923, 27 per cent, came from New Zealand, 13 per cent, from Australia, and 10 per cent, from Argentina; that is, half of the total imports came from the Southern Hemisphere. Similarly, in the case of cheese: in 1903, Canada and the United States supplied S2 per cent, of the total imports, and Holland 13 per cent; in 1904, we find that New Zealand supped 28 per cent; in 1922. New Zealand took the lead with 50 per cent, of the total; in 1923, she supplied 52 per cent., and Canada only 32 per cent. New Zealand has, in fact, now become about the largest exporter of both butter and cheese of any country in the world. This remarkable trend in the dairy produce trade can be shown in another way, perhaps even more striking. In 1903, the butter imported into the United Kingdom from south of the Equator was only 7 per cent, of the total imports. In 1914, the proportion had risen to 21 per cent. In 1923, it was 44 per cent. As regards cheese, in 1903 only 2 per cent, of the total imports came from the Southern Hemisphere; in 1914, the proportion was 29 per cent; by 1923 it had risen to as much as 55 per cent.

Further, there is every reason for supposing that this rapid increase in the dairying industry in the Southern nations will go on. In New Zealand, the climatic conditions are on the whole favourable only to pasture,, farming. Cattle-raising for the frozen meat industry has, it would appear, become unprofitable in that country, and sheep farming is checked by the high price of land. Dairying seems to be the natural and almost the only line open for further agricultural development. New Zealand has a relatively small home market; the proportion of the total production available for export is large, as, in fact, it is in all the countries of the Southern Hemisphere. New Zealanders who are well informed expect to see the dairy exports of that country doubled within the next ten years. Similarly, in Australia, considerable further development of the industry is expected, especially in Queensland. There is every reason to believe that exports of both butter and cheese from New Zealand. Australia, South Africa, and possibly the Argentine, will show important increases in the future, especially those from New Zealand. As regards Canada, the dairying industry is already well established in every province, but outside of Ontario and Quebec the production is only a fraction of what it may be. There are vast areas well adapted for dairying in which the industry only awaits development. On the other hand, however, the growing industrialism in Canada, with its consequent increase in home consumption, will tend towards a lessening of the exportable surplus from that country, which may make up for the increasing total dairy production. Now let us turn to the position within the United Kingdom, and see how we stand. The area under corn is rapidly diminishing. Over a million acres have been lost to corn during the past five years, and this year, compared with last, there has been a further reduction of 212,000 acres. Dairy cattle, on the other hand, are increasing steadily in numbers, and it is quite clear that we have not yet reached i state of economic equilibrium as between corn and grazing; in other words, it is still paying the farmers to lay clown land to pasture. Further, the production of milk is increasing more rapidly than the head of milk-

ing cows. Milk production is becoming more of a science, and unprofitable cattle are being weeded out. The use of good strain bulls, the recording of milk yields, and the adoption of scientific methods of feeding, are gradually having their effect on the average production per cow.