THE DAIRY FARMER AND HIS PRODUCE.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLVIII, Issue 147, 25 June 1914, Page 6

THE DAIRY FARMER AND HIS PRODUCE.

' The New Zealand dairy farmer is far from satisfied with.the marketing of his wares in the United Kingdom, and particularly in London (remarks a Wellington paper). At Palmerston North he made it quite clear that, after years of exploratory work, he has found the weak 'spot in the,, marketing system. He has tried to run in connection with dairying companies, bacon factories, box-making factories, and other departments. So managed they failed, btit "established as independent companies and kept in watertight compartments, as. itv were, they have been successful, given good management. But the .weakness j of the whole matter was the marketing. From the milk-can jto the ship■jstfie the farmer has control of his produce, but as soon as it is placed on board the ocean liner "we put it all (as one- speaker at Palmerston s.iid) into .the hands of the Philistines." Of course, the middleman is indis- j pensable, but his wages may be too high, his good offices too dear—over-, valued by himself. Some of the farmers: were appalled last season at the -extraordinary and quite, unaccountable vagaries, of" the market. " They have calculated (and 'they are as ghrewd and calculating a set bf men as one will find) that they (have lost hundreds of thousands of pounds, or, rather, they hare not; received all they have been entitled to, and they lay the blame upon the shoulders of market manipulators in England. "They have very solid grounds for this. They now propose (subject to the -companies' approval) to form one big company, with a nominal capital of £TuO,ooo, to take over the whole of their produce, and with, it feed the market, and so avoid the losses sustained last year and many years before. They will fix a, minimum price at which the produo© shall be sold,! and "weed out the weak] men," as j they put it. If Wellington, Waira-■! xsip'a, and Taranaki are united on this question, they can act' independently of qther parts of the country, so treat is their aggregate output of oth butter and cheese. Probably the ■suggestion of a minority of the j representatives who first discussed the ■ proposal, .that a much, smaller com~j>any could do what was required, waft to be preferred—for a start at least. The way should, first be felt, ' Ibeoause Canada is not yet a negligible competitor in cheese. England, "too, is a most important supplier of the home market, and there is Siberia developing and Australia steadily increasing cheeso outputs. With a smaller capitalised undertaking it might bo possible to come to an un- j deratanding with Australian butter | and cheese makers, and that country I and this, standing side by side in the •dairy .produce market of the world, would, be a very solid combination for middlemen and market -exploiters to attack. The point is worth consideration, and factory directors who have -mow the proposed scheme before them mew file for future reference the possibility of a Dairy Produce Board of Control, working for the mutual benefit of both Australia and New ■Zealand.