AUSTRALIAN BUTTER POOL

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3072, 7 May 1917, Page 8

AUSTRALIAN BUTTER POOL

. « PRIME MINISTER'S STATEMENT. The following statement regarding the formation of,a butter pool.by the Commonwealth Government was issued by the Prime Minister (Mr. Hughes) last week (and briefly referred to in a cablegram to the New Zealand Press): —Approval has beea given by Mr. W. M. Hughes, the Prime Minister, to a rearrangement of the butter pooling scheme, with the object of obviating the usual substantial advance which takes place each winter in the price of butter in Australia. It has been found impossible to guarantee thatthere will be no increase at all, but it is asserted that it will be a very slight one. Although Australia absorbs 75 per cent, of tho butter output of the Commonwealth, the price of this article in Australia for many years was governed entirely by the London market. When prices were not controlled many factories exported tho whole of thoir product, with the result that a shortage was created in the Commo^wealth. This becam'o so acute on some occasions that speculators bought largo quantities of Australian butter in London, and shipped it back to Australia, where they received tho higher rates ruling locally. It was in October last that the first butter scheme was formulated, and it is claimed that it has worked to the advantage of both producers and consumers. Tho fixed price in Australia was 1495. 4d. per owt. A rearrangement of the- schemo bocame 1 necessary by reason of the fact that as winter approaches supplies of ■butter usually fall off in South Australia and Tasmania, while "Western Australia becomes wholly dependent on the eastern States for its requirements in the coldor months. • Under tho now pool, the producer who has to jstoro butter for the needs of a State other than his own will be placed_ in precisely tho same position as if he sold his butter locally or exported it. He will get from tho pool a cash return. The scheme is the outcome of a conference presided over' by Senator Russell, Minister Controlling Foodstuffs, Attended by the representatives of the butter producers of the respective States and Government dairy experts. The new nool is to bo financed by a floating advance nr> to £100,000, at interest,- from the Commonwealth Bank, ft is to 'be managed by' a. committee nominated' by the dairy interests ]in each State, with the Government diiiry experts and tho Federal Prices Commissioner to watch the .interests of the Government and the general public.