FIJIAN INFORMATION.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume XI, Issue 3366, 19 December 1919, Page 6

FIJIAN I NFORMATION.

’ PROFITEERING IN FLOUR, ‘ti AUSTRALIA ‘AND NEW ZEALAND ASSAILED. _ We in Fiji feel very much the unneighbourly act of Au‘stralia. and New Zealand in the matter of difference in prices (writes the Suva corresponed« ent of the Sydney Daily Telegraph, under date of November 7. ‘He continues: We resent the’fact that We as a lgindred portion of the‘Empir‘e are‘ placed on L 1 lower level than the Ge‘r- i man of Rabaul by Australia, -and the G‘rerman of Samoa by New Zealand. We hear a great deal of the brotherIy vatfection felt for Fiji by Australia and New Zealand, how We are all fellow kinsmen, members of the one Em- I

.' pire, devotees of the olle Motherland, living under the one flag. The ' whole agtrnosphere is flooded with platid tudeg and tears of aifection. But while ‘ the voice is that of Jacob the hands 1 are those cf Eslar.-. It will come as a shock to our peopie To know that 217.‘. those who ‘eat lecal bread are helping to pay eff the Australian war debt at the- rate of 1d a. loaf, and the war debt of New‘ Zealand at the rate of ~}d"a. loaf. Yet such is a fact. The fact may be called by some -other name, but it hurts just the same. Thee price to-day of flour from Australia -is £lB 15/ f.o.b.'

Syidney. That is what it costs the ’Fiji b'a.kel'.. plus freight and landing charges, The Australian biaker can get all the flour he wants at £l3 10/. lil‘-hagt is £5 5/ less than the Fiji baker ‘can start baking at, or id per leaf on the Customs return of flour imiported for ‘the year. i l The Nea Zealand baker gets his flour at £ls 10/, while the Fiji man ‘has topay £lB 7/6 f.-0-.b. Auckland. ’As there is a difi‘erenee~in freight be tween New Zealand and Australia of 12/6 per ton, the Fiji baker can landl luflour here from New Zealand =at 20/ [less than he can from Australia. Australian Wheat is very largely used in making the New Zelalan-d flour. The Commonwealth Government is selling wheat for flour for local consumption at £5 5/ less than wheat for exported flour. The millers, we are informed, are not the profit-makers.‘ It is actually the Government which is profiteering. While the Government is posing before the electors Was the _enemy of pro-fit‘-eering, it is 'a sinner. of *3. bad type itself. G We ean under-I stand Australia selling wheat for for! eign countries -at 2: higher rate than locally, but we candidly cannot understand her attitude in talking‘ platitudes, denouncing profiteering,l pro-i cilaiminrg her =eom;r'a(lesl‘lip '.for other} parts of the Empire. her desire for a‘ Customs union with Fiji, while all fhei time she is penalising the colony in the most mereenar_\,' way possible—inA 9. way which hits every man, woman and child in Fiji. '

The same (adds the correspondent.) ‘applies in every way to New Ze"al-and, which has camouflaged her profiteering under the smug and evil term of a “bonus.” The Fiji baking industry is suffering lieavily from" this profiteering. Bread has risen, not by reason of ordinary yeast, bUt_bCC{lllS(- of the yeast of veiled liostility. So dear is bread ‘that the natives who are at «ordinary times Dread eaters eannot afford it, and have fallen back on native foio«ls_ So, less flour is required in Fiji, and the revenue is suffering. ‘

I am glad to see thaf the Sydney Chamber of Commerce has taken the matter in hand. Such a big injustice is causing a very sore feeling in Fiji, Where over :1 third of the whifes 111:0 Australians.