POST-WAR TRADE

Southland Times, Issue 24877, 17 October 1942, Page 5

POST-WAR TRADE

Overseas Demand For Dairy Produce Post-war trading problems in dairy produce and recent developments in the distribution of butter and cheese in Great Britain were discussed by the chairman (Mr John Fisher) at the annual meeting of the Farmers’ Dairy Federation, Ltd. yesterday. “With the very drastic changes taking place under the Food Control Ministry the future outlook for New Zealand dairy produce is difficult to predict,” he said. “That there will be a great part of the world in urgent need of milk products, both solid and fluid, is apparent. The cry from these people to get it will be equally urgent, against which will be the question of their ability to pay for it. There is also to be faced the fact that Britain has materially increased her own capacity to produce dairy produce and there may arise the question of her ability to pay for outside importations. The unanimity of the great democracies to overcome oppression as typified by the Axis Powers should bring about a solid basis for improved trade relations after the war and the Dominion would share in such improvement.” It was the immediate period after a cessation of hostilities that presented difficulties and there might be very different conditions from those they were accustomed to. A recent development in England paved the way for this in dairy produce. There had been created within the past six months a new company known as the Butter and Cheese Association, Limited, to handle the whole of the dairy produce both produced in Britiain and imported. This company had been formed with the approval of the Ministry of Food and assumed the services hitherto performed by produce distributing firms. Dozens, if not hundreds, of these firms had been practically wiped out overnight and goodwills built up over long years had ceased to exist. Many of the employees of these firms had been absorbed in a great new organization, and an army estimated at 28,000 new civil servants created. This movement was probably found necessary to meet war conditions. It did, however, raise a problem of how a readjustment was to be made when peace was declared. Several Dominion companies were deeply interested in this change.