Fijian Bananas

How Trade is Regulated

Export To N. Zealand

From Our Own Correspondent

SUVA, November 26.

A FURTHER attempt was made to regulate the banana industry at the last meeting of Legislative Council.

Two or three years ago, in the interests of the Fijian banana growers themselves and in order to prevent their complete demoralisation it was decided to proclaim certain areas and to allow only certain buyers to operate in those areas at prices to be fixed by Govern ment.

This was certainly a step in the right direction. It might be described as the ration alisation of the banana industry in Fiji, and had the effect of eliminating uneconomic overhead costs caused by numerous buyers equipped with launches, punts, native assist ants and other impedimenta, all fighting to get a few miserable cases of fruit.

Nowadays the various areas are parcelled out amongst those who had been in the banana business; and, of course, some injus tices occurred. One firm was excluded simply because the Banana Licences Board felt that they were under an obligation to one of their own members, and so he was allotted the area in which this particular firm oper ated —and not the licensed buyer—for many a decade. Such anomalies are annoying, but probably unavoidable.

However, this treatment brought its own reward, in that a system was devised under which fruit was handled from proclaimed areas by outsiders, purely as agents for the Fijians. This system, in its turn, suffered abuses, and it was necessary to regularise it by providing that firms handling fruit as Agents should enter into a bond with the Government in the sum of £100, the same as is required by banana buyers.

This direct control is welcomed by all res ponsible shippers and is realised to be very much in the interests of the banana trade.

Next year will see an increasing quantity of bananas being shipped from Fiji to New Zealand, and all this fruit will have been grown on fresh soil since the floods and hurricanes of 1929-31.

This fruit is just commencing to come in and its influence was seen in the shipment by the Tofua to New Zealand, which rose from 2,500 cases in April, to 11,500 this month. In normal years the Tofua would have taken about 15,000-18,000 cases of bananas at this time of year, so you will see we have still some way to go before we get back to normal.

One of the satisfactory features is that the decline in freights between Canada and Aus

tralia has results in space being available in the mail steamers, Niagara and Aorangi, for bananas from Suva to Auckland. The Niagara to-morrow is to take 3,000 cases, whilst a week later, a cargo steamer, the Karetu, is expected to load 5,000 cases. A fortnight after that, the Tofua is again to load for New Zealand, but she is not likely to take such a large cargo, owing to these other two shipments Bananas are not fetching such a high price as in previous years, but are still realising 10/- a case, f.o.b. The moneys paid out in the purchase of bananas form the bread and

butter moneys of the Fijians, and so between £10,000 and £15,000 should circulate in the Colony in time for Christmas trade, with presumably resulting benefits all round, As to the future, we have to face severe competition in 1932 from Tonga and Samoa, and one hears the usual beach pessimist wax eloquent upon the approaching distinction of the banana industry in Fiji. Our shipping opportunities to New Zealand are so frequent, and the time of transit so much shorter, that these pessimists should realise that unless we can do more than hold our own, the banana industry in Fiji deserves to go under.

Miss Olive Nelson, of Mr. O. F.

Nelson, of Samoa, who lives in Auck land under a decree of banishment, successfully passed her first section of the New Zealand University Law Exams, with great distinction. Miss Nelson was awarded the Butterworth Prize, which is given to the student who passes with highest marks in Jurisprudence.