CO-OPERATIVE DAIRYING.

Waikato Argus, Volume XI, Issue 1034, 29 August 1901, Page 4

CO-OPERATIVE DAIRYING .

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —Although not a dairyman, I take a great interest in matters affecting that class. I therefore offer no excuse in making a few remarks on Mr Spragg’s co-operative proposal. 1 notice you advise suppliers to accept the proposal as it stands, but I submit dairymen will »how themselves deficient in business acumen if they do anything of the kind, without first obtaining an independent valuation, on their own account, of the property to be taken over. Many of the buildings are old, and it is well-known that in a number of creameries the plant could be renewed with advantage. On this point it is possibly superfluous to remind dairymen that, in the future, competition is bound to bo keener than in the past, and, if the Waikato intends to keep in the van, everything must be kept up to date. £40,000 seems n lot of money, but that sum could easily be greatly exceeded by having to renew plants and buildings within a few years. If dairymen m-riously consider Mr Spragg’i proposal the suppliers of each creamery should elect one out of every ten of their number as a committee »nd thin make a levy of, say 3d psr cow, for the purpose of carefully valuing the properties offered. £IOO should be supplied for the purpose, and if a practical carpenter is engaged to value the buildings, and a reliable man to value the plant and machinery, while the city properties, etc., are valued by a third good man, the intending co-opera-tors should then —but not till then—have a fair idea of what they are asked to do. Anyone who has watched tbe butter market and the industry’s expansion in other countries besides New Zealand must form the opinion that prices are at high water mark. At present no branch of farming pays so well; and while admitting that the butter industry is likely to be as permanent as frozen mutton; still, if a drop in prices should come, dairymen will feel the pinch less if they arc supplied with up-to-date buildings and plants which should cost nothing for repairs for some years. Your leader concludes aptly with the quotation from Skakespeare that There is a tida in the affairs of men Which, taken at is flood, leads on to fortune. Evidently Mr Spragg is a student of Shakespeare too !—I am, etc , J. D. P. Morgan.