SHIPPING AND PRODUCE.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 May 1917, Page 5

SHIPPING AND PRODUCE.

OUTLOOK NOT TOO CHEERFUL. (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent). Wellington, May 15. A new cheese store is now being completed for the Wellington Harbor Board, and will be ready for use in- the near future. The board will then have cool storage for about 50,000 crates of cheese, and some, at least, of its present difficulties will be removed. But Wellington, in common with other storage centres, is being pressed severely by the Jack of shipping space for dairy produce, and exporters are not taking a cheerful view of the outlook. .The present dairy season is drawing to a close, although it may be extended in some parts of the country by the recent good rains, but it is going to end wijh the stores full, with the shipping arrangements still uncertain, and with the prospects for the coming season. That, at least, is the view of one exporter, to whom your correspondent mentioned the matter to-day. The extension of cool storage is not going to solve the problems of the dairy farmer if the butter and cheese simply accumulate in the stores, and fail to "find an outlet within ft reasonable time. The acting Prime Minister has indicated plainly, within the last week or two that the shortage of shipping space is likely to become intensified, and there is reason to believe that this probability will have to be pressed upon the attention of the producers long before the end of the present year. There is a growing realisation here, in shipping and export circles, that unless the shipping crisis takes a marked turn for the better before the coming season the farmers will have to produce less butter and cheese, and kill fewer sheep. The gravity of this prospect is admitted on nil hands, but the hard facts arising from the submarine blockade and Britain's need of getting food supplies from the nearest available markets- cannot ho gainsaid. New Zealand has full stores and an inadequate supply of shipping now, and the available information goes to show that the amount of shipping is going to be still further reduced.