Are Seeking

Australian Mills Are Seeking Cheap Copra

WITH reference to our main article, on New Guinea copra, it is reported that the Canberra authorities have fixed the following prices, which they are charging the Australian copra-crushers for New Guinea copra: Hot-air £66 per ton Sundried £66 per ton Smoked £65 7 6 per ton It is reported also that the crushing mills are not happy about the prices they are being charged. They do not see why they should pay the same as Britain. (Copra, bought for £4B sterling in New Guinea, would be worth between £6O and £7O Australian on arrival in Euro pean port).

There is a move afoot to force the Aus tralian Government to sell the 25,000 tons of NG copra, required per annum for Australian consumption, to Australian crushers for less than the price Britain is paying. NG will resist this. Why should New Guinea planters be penalised for the benefit of Australian consumers?

Australia does nothing for the New Guinea planters, except force up to ridiculous levels the costs of nearly everything that the planter has to buy in Australia.

It is reported that last December Messrs. W. R. Carpenter & Co., Ltd., bought from PCB a cargo of copra, in Rabaul, for £7O per ton, and took it to Vancouver. The PCB paid the New Guinea planters, for that copra, just over £4O per ton. And Mr. Ward called the Big Firms “exploiters”