OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 November 1939, Page 5

OTHER PEOPLE’S IDEAS

PRICE OF VEGETABLES (To the Editor.) Sir. —If the advice of the Mayor of Masterton, has been acted upon as regards the growing of vegetables for local consumption, the health of the community will be well preserved and any very noticeable rise in the cost of much-needed supplies of vegetables will be of less consequence and will do less to increase the cost of living than otherwise it might have done under recent circumstances still calling for a measure of mild protest in Masterton, as perhaps elsewhere. In a town that supports at least some half-dozen alien shopkeepers to so great extent as leaves in their hands a virtual monopoly of fruit and vegetable supplies, one would expect a little competition between these shopkeepers which might warrant the expectation of keeping prices on the lowest reasonable scale. The price of sixpence for a cauliflower that one could carry home in a patch-pocket, with no more bulge than a tin of tobacco, is the only evidence of competitive operation coming under my notice this week. Is the real reason for this state of affairs, on the other hand, the too great influx of alien shopkeepers, causing price levels to vise in order to keep six shops going where three might suffice, and keep prices down at same time? There is plenty of room, if the energy existed to promote it. to have a regular weekly-auctioned local supply of fruit and vegetables in season at something nearer market prices elsewhere than exists in Masterton whenever a chance offers to rise prices to peak level, without any very apparent real need for doing so. Trusting that some abler pen than mine will join issue in pointing the way to a more moderate imposition on the housekeeping purse. —I am, etc., "PUZZLED CITIZEN ” Masterton, November 9.