The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times

Hokitika Guardian, 18 October 1932, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18, 1932. THE MEAT PACT. Comment on. the agreement concerning tlm reduction which Great Britain proposes to make l in her importations uf frozen meat from foreign countries is of a favourable nature. A Christchurch business man referring to the proposals says the agreement definitely reduces to a known level the competition of the most formidable rival of New Zealand and Australia in the English market for : lutton and lamb and frozen beef, and bolds the competiteion of that rival at this certain figure for a period of five years. The operations of the quota system applied t'- meat are new, and the rusults can only he obtained by experience. r J'be quota lias been tried in connection with wheat and flour in several Continental countries for some years, generally in connection with an import duty, hut in these cases ti e quota has been altered from ; car to v c ar, and there is no case '.mere a steadily progressive policy over a oeried of years, with a definite and known limitation of supplies Horn a competitor, has been tried. The results to New Zeal ml ami Australia in making room on the English market for lb ir increasing supplies should be g« oil. Whether it will have any effect‘on the price level remains to be seen, because, while the re-

duction in the amount which can be put on tlie British market by South America takes that country back to where it was for six years ago, Australia and New Zealand have leapt ahead with their supplies to such an extent that the total amount by which South America is reduced is not quite equal to the combined increase in lamb of Australia and New Zealand in the on 3 year, December, 1930,.t0 December, 1931. The figures are rather interesting. For the year ended Dccom--31, 1931, South America suppled b,254,416 carcases of lamb to the British market, and the 35 per cent, reduction in this quantity, which will be applied to her by June 30 ( 1934, amounts to 1.819.043 carcases; so that to the end of the five years she will net be able to put on the British market more than 3,435,373 carcases, which is slightly less than she ■exported to Great Britain in 1928. For the year ended December 31, 1931, New Zealand exported 7,956,201 careases of lamb to l Great Britain, and Australia exported 3,106,586 carcases, or 11,362,787 oarcasc-s in all. For the previous year ended December 31, 1930, the combined experts of lamb from Australia mid New Zealand were 8,624,219 enreases, so that the one year showed an increase from the Common wealth and the Dominion of 2,738,568 carcases, so that their combined increase last year wa,s nearly a million carcases mere than the 35 per cent, reduction which will be made on South America. These figures show that the rapidly increasing supplies from Australia and New Zealand would be in danger of not finding a sufficient market to absorb them if South America were increasing her supplies at the .same time, and this definite decrease imposed on South America must undoubtedly ease the situation for Australia and New Zealand. The same thing applies to mutton to a lesser degree, and to beef to a still lesser degree so far as New Zealand is concerned, as our exports of frozen beef from’New Zealand have been diminishing for years. Last year they amounted to 140,000 quarters only. It is difficult to prophesy the results hu + it should enable nearly 2,000,000 can ases of Empire lamb to b e substituted for foreign lamb on the British market.