FREIGHT ON CHEESE.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 February 1921, Page 4

FREIGHT ON CHEESE.

A REDUCTION AGREED TO. LARGE SAVING TO By Telegraph—Press Assodatlon. Dunedin, Last Night. The South Island Dairy Association! has just received advice by cable from London of an agreement to reduce cheese freights to l|d per lb, plus 10 per cent., this reduction being retrospective to and including the November shipment. This has been accepted. It represents a reduction on this season’s cheese freights to London from the Dominion of at. least £200,000. What cheese freights mean to the shipping companies may be gauged from the fact that a farthing per pound represents a quarter of a million sterling. STATEMENT BY PREMIER. REDUCTION WILL SAVE £213,000. Christchurch, Last Night. Mr. Massey has for some time past been communicating with the Imperial Government in order to get a reduction in ftheese freights, and to-day, speaking at Rangiora, he announced that he had just received a communication indicating a considerable reduction in the freight* rate of cheese. The rate is reduced l|d, plus IQ per cent., the reduction to be applicable to the first shipment of new season’s cheese as from November 1 last, and subsequent shipments. Mr. Mmsey said this meant a saving to the cheese producers of the Dominion of not less than £213,000 on freight, based on last year’s export. PROTEST AGAINST INCREASE. VIEWS OF SHIPOWNERS. London, Dec. 10. At the tim6 of writing, negotiations are proceeding with regard to the freight, which the shipowners have decided • shall be charged for cheese carried from New Zealand to the Home Country, but, so far, no new arrangement has been made. In response to a from Mr. Massey, the Produce Department of the High Commissioner’s Office has taken uj) the matter, but in addition an independent meeting of the House and Foreign Exchange, at which the principal agents for New Zealand cheese were fully represented, was held, to consider the question. Some of these agents have already sold a portion of the Dominion cheese, which has not yet arrived, on a c.i.f. basis, but subject to any rise in freight, so that they are duly protected. The ‘ object of their meeting was merely as a protest on behalf of the producers, whom they represent, and the consumers in this country, Tt was decided at the meeting to forward a letter to the Australian Refrigerated Tonnage Committee, a Department of the Ministry of Shipping, asking them to receive a deputation from • the agents and brokers, headed by Mr. Arthur J. Mills (of Messrs Mills and Sparrow, Tooley-street), who was chairman of the meeting. A reply is awaited,

Under the system of control the shipping companies sold their refrigerated space to the Government on a basis of 132 s fid per 40 cubic feet, which worked out at the rate of 1 5-16 d per pound. It has- now been disclosed that the companies applied to the Tonnage Committee in November and were granted an increased rate of 144 s per cubic foot, which represents 1 7-16 d per pound, this rate to be retrospective to March, 1919.

It is on this latter basis that the shipping companies have arranged their present charge of I4d plus 10 per cent. This, however, is equal to 1 13-20 d per pound, a matter of 17-80 d more than the allowance made bv the Government, or an increase of £2 per ton.

COST OF TRANSPORT. Although the rate is above the equivalent of the chartered rate paid by the Imperial Government to the shipowners, it is maintained that the Government rate did not include coastal charges. This, of course, is a moot point, as the agents here affirm that the Government’s net freight included coastal charges. Then again, as one representative of the shipping companies pointed out to me, in converting the cubic rate to a poundage rate a margin has been left foi' .broken stowage. According to the same authority, the cost of shipbuilding is four times as much as in pre-war days. The cost of working is three times as much. Freight for cheese was. y 2 d per pound before the) war, and the present increase, he maintained, is not in proportion to the increase in the costs of transport. Certainly the price of cheese had not rjsen proportionately to the increase in freight, but the fact could not be a prime consideration. In any case, they could not be expected to charge less than it cost to carry the goods, and if they took anything on the proposed charge it would be a sacrifice—a sacrifice which they might make on occasions to help to develop an industry, but which the present circumstances did not warrant. In spite of this assertion, however, another shipping manager was of opinion that some measure of reduction would eventually be made.

An unfavourable comparison has also been made between the freights charged from New Zealand and those from other parts of the world. Against this, it is asserted that the difficulty of obtaining outward freights to the Dominion is greater than in the case of many other countries, and some of the steamers have to return with a limited cargo, and in some cases part of the voyage is made in ballast.