The Wanganui Herald (Published Daily.) FRIDAY, JANUARY 30, 1920. CALF AND PIG SHORTAGE.

Wanganui Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16037, 30 January 1920, Page 4

The Wanganui Herald (Published Daily.) FRIDAY, JANUARY 30, 1920. CALF AND PIG SHORTAGE.

In corroboration of our remarks on Wednesday concerning some of the effects following in the wake of the dried-milk industry, there appeared in the . Dominion of the same date a letter from a well-known Rahotu (Taranaki) dairy farmer, emphasising the dangerous situation into which Ave are drifting on account of the Avholesale slaughter of calves now going on. The writer, Mr W. R. Wright, does not speak with special reference to the driedmilk industry, but from a general view point, and what he has to say ought to be enough (we certainly hope it Avill) to awaken public men and Parliamentarians to the need of their taking more interest in the matter than they have hitherto . displajmd.. Mr Wright’s letter is significant enough to quote lengthily. He says: . . The conditions this season are so much Avorse that public attention should be very seriously directed to them. The enclosed cutting shows that between 30,000 and 40,000 calves have been killed in the Waikato this spring, while the report of one Taranaki firm Aloue stated that, for their November sale, 5100 calfskins were catalogued, and the stock inspectors estimate the killings in Taranaki at 40 per cent. Now, does anyone Avonder at this, with good mixed Shorthorn weaners selling in Cambridge a month ago at 10s each (their skins were worth 9s to 15s), and here in Taranaki, a week ago, for good, Avell-bred Aveaner heifers 25s Avas bid. So many freezing works are now operating (many of them overlapping one another), that the slaughter of calves is suicidal, for in two to three years beef will be unobtainable. With milk and meal at such high Amines the rearing costs of calves at flA r e months exceed £4 10s (Avhich is the absolute minimum), and, as there is not a hope of getting this, indiscriminate slaughter iyust continue. The New South Wales Government has tackled this calf-killing question, and when townspeople have to pay 2s to 2s 6d per lb for steak, then the cry will go up; ‘Why... didn’t Massey see to all this?’ ”

It Avould appear, too, that, hoAVeA 7 er much any fanner may deplore this state of things, he himself has to go with the tide —probably the conditions force it on him—for Mr Wright, speaking personally, says that he controls upAvards of 40 0 dairy cows, and that, next season, only heifer calves and any bull calves from pedigree Holstein cows will be reared on bis places. The cutting referred to in his letter to the Dominion reads as follows;

“The Inspector of stock at Morrinsville, Auckland, reports that between 30,000 and 40,000 calves have been killed in the Waikato this summer. He states that farmers find it 'does not pay to rear calves and pigs while present high prices for butter fat continue. New country is not being opened up quickly enough to absorb all young stock, and he predicts a tremendous shortage of beef.”

We notice that, referring to the conference in Wellington with representatives of the bacon industry, Premier Massey, with a curious inability to perceive the real kernel of the problem, said: “The real trouble is that there are no pigs in the country.” May we suggest that what he should have said is: “The real trouble is the prevailing conditions, which make it impossible to keep pigs.” In other words, the shortage of pigs is not the cause, but only the effect. The causes are something different, viz., the high prices for butter fat, and particularly for milk for dried and condensed milk making, to say nothing of the price that has to be paid for calf food, also the high prices paid for skins, also the high and increasing cost of land, and the lack of new settlement to absorb young stock. If the Government gave its attention to these matters, it would soon cease to be worried about the shortage of pigs. And what applies to pigs applies equally to calves. The calves being killed to-day should by rights be supplying us with beef in two or three years’ time. But whatever the shortage of meat now, the alarming figures quoted by Mr Wright indicate that it is as nothing to what it will be by the time the calves, otherwise, would be grown up. We are, in short, selling the future for the sake of present profit. Indeed, we are, to a large extent, selling the present as well. Mr Massey will not make himself popular with farmers generally by interfering with their present profitable operations,. But he is going to make himself very unpopular with the country generally if he doesn’t. It has to be admitted that he is in somewhat of a dilemma in having to choose between the country generally and the farmers who are mostly his chief supporters. But it will at all events give him a chance to show what statesmanship and strength he possesses..lf things go on as they are, then, as the writer quoted above says, the cry will certainly be: “Why didn't Massey see to ail this?”