CHINESE MARKET GARDENERS.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIV, Issue 9162, 4 June 1908, Page 7

CHINESE MARKET GARDENERS.

NOT TO HAVE A MONOPOLY ; IN AUCKLAND.

Press Association

Auckland, June 2.

The Chinese-are not to be allowed to have a monopoly of combination injihe market gardening business in Auckland, for the Europeans engaged in the industry have formed an association. This association met on Friday, and agreed that what with Chinese competition and the threatened turning of prisoners into market gardeners, the ordinary market gardener would find himself in a hopeless position if he didn’t kick The gardeners present thought there wore enough of thorn in the business to do something by oraguisiug, and then a brilliant suggestion cropped up, A member of the Waitemata Fruitgrowers’ Association was present, and thought the market gardeners should join forces with the strawberry growers, and auction their wares under the auspices of the fruit-growers. The idea was seized upon at once, and a sub-committee formed with -a view to go into the whole question, together with a sub-committee of fruit-growers, and, if possible, frame a scheme of amalgamation. There is no thought of establishing a “corner” in cabbages, or getting an option over the crop of spring onions, but the growers feel that they are engaged in a struggle for existence, and if they are to live at all there must be combination. Therefore, they are inviting all European growers of vegetables to come in under the banner. “The prices of vegetables may seem high,” said a grower at the meeting, “but the grower doesn’t get the profit. Vegetables have to go through the hands of an auctioneer, and then through the shops of middlemen, before they reach the consumer, and vegetables, being perishable goods, the middleman has to look out for a good margin of profit and provision against loss. There is a lot of talk in this city about keeping the Chinese away from New Zealand, but while speakers at dinners and other functions are saying ‘we must see to it that the Chinese do not get a tooting here,’ the speakers’ wives are mying vegetables at the back door from a Chinaman. Really, it is astonishing the class of house and the number of persons who calmly tell a European ‘Nothing to-day,’ and five minutes latex order all sorts of vegetables from a Chinese hawker.”