SHEEPFARMER'S RETURNS

Hokitika Guardian, 20 September 1932, Page 2

SHEEPFARMER'S RETURNS

A WELLINGTON COMPLAINT. WELLINGTON, September 17. A farmer correspondent has sent in an account sales of his clip of 34 bales, comprising 4 bales A hoggets, 10 bales Ist pieces, 11 baie3 Ist bellies and 9 bales E., the total weight being 13,9311 b. The prices realised were sd, 4d, 3d, and 2-}d per ”lb respectively, the gross proceeds 1 totalling £195 18s Id. Th e total charges from farm to sale amounted to £3B 13s 9d, the net return being £157 4s 4d. The farmer in his covering letterpoints out: “(1) Th e extraordinarily high charges of the wool-broking firms ; (2) the celling charges amounted to approximately one-fifth of the gross proceeds; (3) the wool cost, inclusive of the pack and 'shearing, £1 10s P er hale; (4) the wool cost 11s per bale in freights to -deliver to store, Wellington ; (5) selling charges amounted t-o £1 5s per bale ; (6) the overhead and selling charges total approximately £3 6s per bale; (7) the grower of this wool only nets approximately £2 9s. per bale.” He concludes: “I consider this an interesting explanation of how, owing to the low prices ruling at the present time, the farmer's net proceeds from wool are practically negligible.”

The cure for the farmers’ troubles appears to li e in a ‘‘rise of the general level of commodity prices to a height fixed of semi-fixed charges,” this being stated bv the report of the Currency ,Committee of the Ottawa Conference as one of the -moot important conditions precedent to the re-establishment of any international monetary standard.