BUTTER FOR LOCAL USE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4877, 14 September 1925, Page 4

BUTTER FOR LOCAL USE.

SUGGESTION OF GRADING. ADVANTAGES TO BE GAINED. Referring to the New Zealand “Heraid’s” isugges-tion that butter intended for consumption in New Zealand should be graded by a Government grader before being sent to the retailers for disposal, Mr A. Morris, superintendent of the butter department of the N.Z. Co-operative Dairy Cp„ stated that in his opinion the scheme was impracticable. If the suggestion was adopted the butter would have to be sent iu ! bulk to the nearest grading station and then railed back to the factories to be made up into pound pate. This would entail a great deal of extra expense in freight and storage charges, while the extra railage would be certain to involve deterioration in quality. A factory at Taumarunui, for instance, would have to send its butter !o either Wellington or Auckland to the grading stores and back again. There was no necessity for the independent grading of butter intended for local consumption, said Mr Morris. because the keen competition of the various, companies to secure local trade secured to the public the best passible safeguard against the sale of inferior, butter. It was the aim of every factory to make butter of the highest quality, and most factories had various brands to indicate the different grades of quality. The factories would welcome alii independent grading system, but he was afraid such a system would prove unworkable. SCHEME PRACTICABLE. A statement that the grading of butter for local consumption was quite practicable and could be done at nominal cost was made by Mr W. A. Leonard,. of Messrs Leonard and Son, distributors of. dairy produce, in reply to the contention of Mr A. Morris, superintendent of the b.tuter department of the N.Z. Co-operative Dairy Co., that such a scheme was impracticable. Mr Leonard said there was no necessity for the butter to ge from the factories to teh grading stations in bulk, as was done in the case of butter for export. The butter could easily be graded in pats, and this scheme was being followed by his firm. One of the pats was taken from a box and the butter tested in the ordinary way. The extra ccst for grading worked out at 1.5 d a box. Every box was graded. His firm had shipped butter to Honolulu for many years, past, and the butter had always been graded in pats. There were several advantages about having butter graded, said Mr Leonard. It was true to label as to quality ; it contained only the legal maximum of water, 16 per cent.; it wap tested for boric preservatives, and their absence was verified when so stated on the label; and the butter reached the supplier and consumer frozen hard.