PORT CONGESTION

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22339, 26 May 1947, Page 2

PORT CONGESTION

SLOW TURN-ROUND MAIN PORT PROBLEMS “There can be no question but that the utilisation of secondary ports to the greatest possible degree would relieve the position and effect a considerable speeding-up in the delivery of cargoes, both inward and outward,” writes Mr. C. 11. Williams, president of the Gisborne provincial organisation of Federated Farmers, in a letter to the Herald, in which he points out an error in the transcription of a motion carried at last week’s conference relative to the claims of secondary ports. The error to which Mr. Williams refers was the substitution of a placename for a general term, which made a clause of the motion read: “(a) Relieve the congestion at Napier ports,” instead of “ a.t main ports.” In his letter Mr. Williams points out that while the mistake is a trifling one it may cause misunderstanding among Gisborne's southern neighbours. “I know of no undue congestion at the port of Napier, nor do I think that such is likely to develop; but congestion has been very much in evidence at Auckland and Wellington on numerous occasions, so much so that it has become at times a ruling factor in the rate of dispatchment of produce to the United Kingdom,” Mr. Williams comments.

“The deplorably slow turn-round of overseas ships is causing concern in this country, loss to the producers and. most important, distress and hardship to those whom we are most anxious .to help.”