WHEAT GROWING

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 764, 10 September 1929, Page 8

WHEAT GROWING

Sir,— Why is bread the price it is? Wheat in Melbourne is os 6d a bushel; flour, £l2 10s a ton. In New Zealand, wheat is 5s Gd a bushel; flour £lB a ton—£s 10s dearer. The wages are as high in Melbourne as in New Zealand, if not higher. Every penny a bushel fall in the price of wheat means thousands to the millers, but bread does not come down. The Canterburv farmer is quite right to have a wheat pool. Dr. E. P. has said that the wheatgrower crops the same land year after year. He does no such thing. He takes two or three crops off and then lays the land in grass for three or four years before he breaks it up again. If the industry is killed it will throw a considerable amount of labour on the market, and what are the mills going to do, for their price for milling wheat is far higher than the Australian price? We shall have to send a large sum of money out of the country each year, for our flour when we could easily grow all we need in our own country. As for the pig and poultry farmer, he can grow a lot of feed for his animals and birds. Why should we let Australian wheat como in free? Australia will not let any of our farm produce enter the Commonwealth on such terms. I’M ALONE.