POTATOES AT 6D A BAG

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 334, 20 April 1928, Page 12

POTATOES AT 6D A BAG

ROTTING IN GOODS SHEDS AUCKLAND MARKET GLUTTED Commencing from March 30 four Southern boats unloaded at the Auckland wharves over a month’s supply of mostly unmatured potatoes. Little more than 20 per cent, of the consignments passed into consumption in good order. The last parcel, amounting to about 100 sacks, left the shipping sheds last evening for a gross return to the sellers of 6d a sack. Late March contracts from the South were unavoidably held up. Then four boats arrived with heavy shipments one after the other within the space of little more than a week. The position was accentuated by the fact that speculators in the South sought to take advantage of the high prices which were ruling in Auckland owing to the non-arrival of supplies, and sent forward consignments, with little thought of the contracted parcels which went North once supplies and the shipping space was available. Thus brokers here were given the job of endeavouring to unload further supplies on an already well-filled market. All the time the potatoes, which had not matured sufficiently at the time of digging to keep indefinitely, were going back in condition. Huge stacks of the tubers in the shipping companies’ sheds awaiting owners rapidly deteriorated. One line sold as in good order and condition one day would be found to contain a sodden mass on the bottom rows of the stack when the carriers came to take delivery the next. The weight of the top rows* of the stack would gradually pulverise the tubers lower down. In between the wet sacks swarmed a moving mass of maggots. Practically every lot had to be picked over. At the finish the principal buyers were hawkers, who had to spread their purchases along the wharf, hose them down and rebag when dried. The effect will be, however, that for the next week or so, storekeepers’ sales will suffer as a result of the activities of the travelling salesman with cheaper-priced tubers. As there is no further shipment expected until the middle of next week the position should not take long to get back to normal. In the meantime the nominal price for best quality potatoes, through store, ranges up to £ 7 a ton. Many of the Southern shippers of the lots which have just been cleaned up will barely clear freight and wharfage, while some again will receive debit notes.