AUSTRALIAN GOODS IN MALAYA

Rotorua Morning Post, Issue 5308, 22 January 1947, Page 3

AUSTRALIAN GOODS IN MALAYA

; EXPORTS ACTIVE i ! POOR QUALITY OF SOME ARTICLES NOTED. ! Australian goods are appearing j freely on shop ?helves in Malaya and ; even Sumatra, but there are still com- | plaints about grading, packing and ! labelling, writes H. A. Standish in the j Sydney Morning Herald. | When I found Australian products well represented in Singapore, among the flood of goods from all over the world that sell for fantastie prices in the Chinese shops of the free port, I was cheered by the belief that de- | spite the need for consumer goods at . home,- Australian lex^iarters were j really on the ball, to capture the vast market of south-eastern Asia. lan Morrison, correisr/onde»it of f The Times and son of famous Austva- [ lian "Chinese" Morrison, told me that on a reeent trip through the interior of Sumatra he had found bottles of | Australian tomato sauce in primitive villafte shops. They Jiad been taken from Singapore by junk and, the Dutch would say, "smuggled" into Sumatra up one of the innumerable mangrove-fringed waterways. A Singapore man, driving me home to dinner, ealled at a greengrocer's shop. A well-developed uauliflovfer caught his eye. "Yes" they told him, "it's fresh by ship from Australia, woight thvee and a fiuarter lhs." Pric-o? The Snails doliat oquivalent of 18. '6 AasLalian. "Xot for me." he said, "but plenty of people will pay that price. beeause it is in good eornlition." There was a ditferent story about a reeent shipload of A-ustralian potatoes, but in that case apparently nobody was to hlamc. There was ari unhealthily long tinie between loading in Australia and unloading in Singapore. and the potatoes eould not stand the strain. There was no suggcstion that they 1 were in anyihing but good eondition when loaded. I ara not-sure Whieh end of the voyage there was a strike, b'.it Singapore is having a 'good share of industrial troufcle. Serious Com plaints I found. however, that there were serious complaints about some Australian goods. Nobody suggestecl that these cases were typical, but everybody I spoke to, including household eonsumers, importers and ofikials, was emphatie that a few exporters were spoiling the generaliy good name of Australan products. My fi'iend, who did not buy the eauliflower at 18s 6d, toki me that he had opened a tin of Australian aprij r;ts, found fo.r beautiful half-fruit on the top, but the reniainder were of inferior size and qualily. Ile tol.l me the -brar.d, of whieh I had never heard before. Laijellirg oi Australian tir.aed goods. lio said, was often far behind that of eompetitive goods, and tinb were sometimes damaged beeause they had been packed in eardboard boxes whieh would not stand ships' slings. Another side of the packing picture was given by a man Yvho lcnew the difficulty about getting case tim!ier, but saw a well-cased shipment of c.-ri'ied goods from Australia in paeke t eondition in a ship's hokl in Sii gapoie, but a shambles of broken wood aud battered tins by ilte tkne ir was in the v.harf shol. Some specilic complaints, tested and f'ou.'ui justiiiable, whieh I heard a .'•aiiVs,!. Austialian goods wero:--Toothbvushes: The buyer placed an order expeeting a eonvcntionally designed article but when the bru'shes ariived they proved to have brisiles all the way round, so that, to quote my informant, "anybody who used t.hem would have skinned gums before he got his teeth clean." Not According to Sampie. KJectric Irons: Design crude, but as they were kougrtt at'ter submission of a sasnijk' thi.-. v.'ould not have matter(■d so iiiueh if they had coni'oi mad with ihe sample. They did not, tipplate and vabber lead-in for liex boing missing. Tinned Cabbage: Genernl-c-omplaints about tiuaiity an.l tlavcur. An expert commented that tinned cabbage was known in Australia as a product whieh should not have been allowpd to be exported. Cakes in Tins: Arrived with liberal coating of fungus beeause tins were not sealed. F'ault uuderstood to be remedied in future shipments. I did not go around looking for complaints about AustraliaVi goods. These were mentioned to me by people with the interests of Australian trade very much at heart, people who fear that individual carelessness may help to lose Australia a great opportunity. The remedv they advoeate, broadlv, is that wherever possible Australian exporters should appoint agents, local distributors, in Singapore who will be responsible for the quality of the goods they supply to retailers. This plus careful grading, labelling and packing. Australia has a tremendous trade opportunity in south-east Asia, with ])oth geography and sentiment on her side. Wandering through the "Great World," one of Singapore's famous amusement centres, I saw two toy Koala bcars sitting among the junk on a stall. I asked the smiling Chinese girl attendant what they were. "Australian aniinal, very •popular," she said. The price was just a little more than that of the three and quarter pouru! of cauliflower.