N.Z, DAIRY CRISIS

Waikato Times, Volume 116, Issue 19456, 21 December 1934, Page 12

N.Z, DAIRY CRISIS

BRITAIN’S FRIENDLY VIEW SUPPORT FOR DOMINION TRADE. (From a correspondent.) LONDON, Nov. 14. The report of the New Zealand Royal Commission to the Dominion Government on the problems facing the dairy industry lias been received sympathetically by the British press. The leading London and provincial dailies have given it editorial comment. None, apparently, is prepared to endoTsc the Commission’s suggestion that New Zealand should claim from the Imperial Government particular preferential treatment over other Dominions in return for extended tariff concessions to Imports from the United Kingdom; but the remainder of what the Commission says is _ admitted by the great majority to be just. Tile rimes, the Morning Post, and the Daily Express all draw attention to the d-sclosure of the extent to which the British- market has been depressed by the dumping by oversea dairying countries other than New Zealand, though at tire same time The Times, while agreeing that Bi ain s international trade position will need to be reconsidered when the Imperial discussions take place in London next year, is strictly non-committal towards the Commission’s recommendations. . .The Financial News emphasises the “ unpalatable implications of Eliiolism ” as it affects Britain’s food sup-, plies from overseas, the further development of Dominion trade, and the security of Imperial investments. The Manchester Guardian does the same. The Liverpool Journal of Commerce, quoting on this point the recent remarks of Sir James Parr, the New Zealand High Commissioner, draws attention to the exceptional trade preferences which New Zealand is giving to British industry, and points out that “ any. considerable contraction in the supplies of foodstuffs from our Southern Dominions will be a further blow to our shipping interests, which have been sufficiently hit by subsidised competition, and even by our own fiscal experiments.”

Motor-Cars for Dairy Produce. A warning almost simultaneous with this was uttered by Lord Essendon, chairman of the Shaw Savill and Albion Shipping Company, when a ship of that line, R.M.S. Mataroa, left London with a cargo of 5-00 British motorvehicles for New Zealand. News of the despatch of this record single consignment, and of Lord Essendon’s appeal for the granting of special treatment to New Zealand in the matter of quotas, will have already reached the Dominion press, but since then this latest instance of Die fruits of Imperial •reciprocity lias had a sequel the publication in the British press of a letter from the three members of •Parliament in which constituencies the ■ greater number of the motor-vehicles in question were manufactured — Major L. Beaumont Thomas (King’s Norton. Birmingham), Caplain W. F. Strickland (Coventry), and Mr W. G. D. Hutchison (Romford). This letter, to which newspapers in motor manufacturing areas gave particular prominence, says that, largely as a result of the increased tariff preferences granted by New Zealand to British cars, the United Kingdom’s share in the Dominion’s motor trade lias risen since 1929 from 15 per cent. „to 78 per cent., and Unit for the first nine months of 1934 the value of New Zealand’s imports of British cars lias increased by £218,000, or 145 per cent. “Here, then,” they conclude, "is surely an outstanding example of the value of Empire markets —an example which lends weight lo the claims of New Zealand primary producers for continued favoured treatment in this market. It should hlso act as an inducement to those who now thoughtlessly buy foreign dairyproducts to insist in future upon New Zealand butler and cheese.”

Foreign Agreements Condemned

Sir llcnry Page Croft, chairman of the Empire Industries Association, has again pleaded strongly and .urgently for an extension of trade with the Dominions. In a recent press interview he declared that for the first nine months of this year exports of British manufactures to Empire countries totalled £112,510,000, or £ 1 740,000 more than the total to all foreign countries combined. “These figures," he remarks', “present an unchallengeable case for continuing our present preferential treatment of Empire foodstuffs. We must also refrain from hindering 'the progress of the Empire countries by making hastily conceived trade agreements with foreign countries.” The New- Zealand Dairy Produce Board supplemented Sir Henry Page Croft’s statement with a circular to 'the press showing that New Zealand in tiie period he mentions lias increased her purchases of British manufactures by £1,171,000, or 21 per cent., Hie principal increases being in motor vehicles, iron and steel goods, and textiles. Lancashire Campaign Opons. The preferential treatment given by New Zealand to British textile goods is, by the way, being used as an effective argument by the Dairy Produce Board in its sales campaigns in Yorkshire and Lancashire. The “drive” it had organised in Leeds and Bradford is now drawing to an end, and it is worth noting that entries for its grocers’ window display competitions number 100 in eacli city. Yesterday the board opened a campaign in Manchester, and there it is not failing to emphasise that New Zealand makes a return for the free entry for her dairy and oilier produce into tiie United Kingdom by admitting many kinds of British goods, including Lancashire textiles, duty free and imposing higher duties on rival foreign products. Another of the new Empire food ships, the Blue Star Line’s Imperial Star, inis within the past few weeks been launched at Belfast, and on November 22 this company’s second ship, 1 lie New Zealand Star, will also he launched. The Blue Star Line has since announced I hut if is going t o build three similar vessels for the Dominion food trade, and calls for tenders. The Shaw. Savill and Albion Company's second new cargo liner, the Waipawa, IcH Liverpool on November ti on her maiden voyage to New Zealand. and on November 2i the New Zealand Shipping Gompnny’s new ship Dorset will lake her place in the Dominion trade.