DAIRY SURPLUS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 May 1938, Page 8

DAIRY SURPLUS

ESTIMATES OF PROBABLE AMOUNT MAY REACH THREE MILLIONS. MUCH PRODUCE IN HAND. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) . AUCKLAND, May 25. Although dairying authorities are loath to base estimates on future market conditions, which have proved their instability in past years, there is a fairly general opinion that at the close of the season the Dairy Industry Account will contain a surplus of from £2,500,000 to £3,000,000. On the basis of the more conservative assumptions, it was calculated that the butter section might be in credit to the extent of £1,800,000 sterling, and that the corresponding figure for cheese would be perhaps £310,000 sterling, making an aggregate in New Zealand currency of over £2,500,000. In some quarters it is considered that fully half of the Dominion’s butter production has yet to be sold, and, with the total quantity assessed at between 140,000 and 150,000 tons of produce, it was stated that about 70,000 tons would be quitted on what should prove a steadily-rising market. It was stated in support of these figures that on April 30, three months’ butter was in store in the Dominion. However, the opinion was expressed by another authority that reliable overseas estimates suggested that 60,000 tons remained to be sold. It was expected that the market would reach a peak of about 140 s in 'August, and the average price forecast for unsold stocks of butter from the middle of May was 1355. This would yield a surplus of £1,380,000 sterling over the guaranteed price, and to this £550,000 in New Zealand currency was to be added. Up to the middle of this month the profit realised by the Marketing Department on cheese has been estimated at £58,000 on the basis of 72s 6d a cwt. It is considered that unsold produce will realise a credit of over £252,000, making a total profit of £310,000 sterling. It was pointed out that any estimate based on market predictions should not cause farmers to be over sanguine, as price fluctuations in June, July, August and September, although expected to be favourable, could not be determined with accuracy. It was recalled that, following early forecasts of a large deficit in the account last year, the market in the latter portion of the season rose beyond expectations. Addressing the annual interprovincial conference of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union at Wellington on Tuesday the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon M. J. Savage, stated: “The dairy-far-mer has already been told that whatever surplus there is in the dairy industry account belongs to him. I sat on the platform with the Minister of Marketing during his address at Lower Hutt last week and I heard Mr Nash say that he hoped to be able to go into this with his officers and make the surplus available. “Mr Nash said very definitely that he hoped that by the time the dairymen met at New Plymouth he would be able to tell them how it would be done. Mr Nash told the farmers very definitely that the surplus in the dairy account belonged to the dairy-farmers and to no one else, and that he was working out a plan that would be given at New Plymouth.”