Business and Development

Bananas Are Bad Travellers

In The New Container Ships

From a Suva correspondent

For many years bananas have been the major export from the Islands to New Zealand. Although there has been considerable fluctuation in the trade, with good and bad periods tending to alternate, in 1970 bananas represented 17 per cent of Tonga’s, 1 per cent of Fiji’s and 16 per cent of Western Samoa’s total exports to

[New Zealand.

The banana trade has always been ; catered for by the Union Steam Ship 'Go’s New Zealand - Pacific Islands service, using conventional vessels equipped with special refrigerated chambers. Recent trends in the ship ping industry, however, have caused the USS Co to investigate the replace ment of this type of vessel by stern loading Tarros-class container ships.

I Conventional vessels are becoming too expensive to operate on many routes because of their slow turaround time in port and their high stevedoring and crew costs.

The problem, even with smaller container ships of the Tarros class, is that they represent a new tech nology for the Pacific Islands and require the provision of certain additional port facilities, together with in port and shipper practices.

Since September, 1972, the USS Co has been carrying out investigations into the carriage of bananas from the Islands to New Zealand in refrigerated containers, as part of a wider feasi bility study of the operation of the Tarros class vessels, and the results of the tests are so far proving none ;too encouraging.

The first trial shipment from Suva of 300 cases of bananas packed into each of two refrigerated containers, was loaded on to the Waikare in 1972. Nineteen days later, the containers were discharged in Auckland after the vessel had called at both Western Samoa and Tonga.

The containers were accompanied

on the voyage by Mr Alan King, an expert refrigeration engineer from Sea Containers Inc. Between Suva and Auckland, heavy condensation inside the containers made it necessary to open the doors to remove drainage plugs, and on opening the doors water was reported swilling around some of the cases of bananas. Later in the voyage Mr King’s temperature recording gear broke down, and in Samoa one container’s cooling equipmem was accidentally switched off for from five to six hours.

The fruit discharged from the containers at Auckland was in a very mixed condition; some of it soft green, some firm green and some over ripe, Some cases contained both green and ripe fruit and occasional cases were mildewed. Generally, the condition of the fruit from both containers turned out very poorly. Examination of the records of temperature record-

ing equipment in the containers showed excessive temperature vari ations between the top and bottom ana the front and back of the con tainers, and also between the two containers. These variations in tern perature of about 5 deg Fahr were described by Mr M. R. Dossar in his report on the shipment as, “entirely unsatisfactory for the commercial carriage of bananas”.

T . . . , u . . . , In ** second trial shipment made fr ° m Apia m November, 1972 two refrigerated containers on board Waikare were each stowed with 290 cases °J The containers dis charged 10 days later in Auckland, * ere not accompanied by a refngera tlon engineer and there were no serious techmcal Problems on the v °y a g e - The fruit was discharged in gener ally good condition, with just the occasional ripe fruit scattered through

out. Chilling of the bananas was noticeable however, particularly at the back of the containers. Tempera ture variations of 2 deg Fahr occurred within the two containers and between the containers, as before.

I A third trial shipment was to have been made in mid-January but was cancelled, apparently because of the problems experienced with the first

|two trials.

According to Fruit Distributors’ report, “the two trials completed show that there are still a number of serious difficulties which need to be corrected before the containers can carry fruit at optimum carrying con ditions”. Problems of temperature [control, which are likely to be greatly magnified in a ship carrying 20-30 containers of bananas, are apparently the major problem, while humidity control, chilling and the reliability of equipment are other worries.

The first two trials involved Fruit Distributors Limited in financial losses through the fruit arriving in poor condition and having to be sold by [auction at low prices. Obviously there will have to be significant im provements in the condition of bananas discharged from refrigerated containers at Auckland if the system is to prove commercially workable. * Even assuming that the technical problems of carrying bananas in con tainers can be solved, and this is by no means certain, a number of other fairly serious difficulties face the pro posed New Zealand-Pacific Islands container operation as a whole. Port problems are not the least of these.

One thing is certain, if rising ship operating costs and attendant increases in freight rates are to be controlled at all, then some move towards con tainerisation or utilisation is essential.

Solomons' timber

recovering

[ Slowly recovering prices and plans to expand, point to a healthy timber industry in the BSIP, in spite of lower exports in 1972. A drop of about 5i per cent in exports in 1972 was the first decline in 10 years.

I The BSIP Conservator of Forests, Mr Keith Treneman, attributed the 1972 result to a fall in prices in Japan, and Cyclone Ida which stopped the Allardyce Lumber Co’s plans to ex pand on Ysabel. The company did not actually reduce production, but had it not been for the cyclone it would have increased production.

When timber prices fell in Japan, the Japanese company, Shortland De velopment Ltd, stopped operations.

The revenue collected in 1972 from timber export duty and royalties was a record $325,000 because some revenue left over from 1971 was col lected in 1972.

The 1973 exports are expected to be about the same as 1972, and after that the steady annual increase en joyed in the 10 years to 1971 should return.

Mr Treneman said prices had fallen markedly in 1972, but now were slowly improving. The Kalena Timber Co planned to expand its operation at Viru, New Guinea, Levers had plans to expand on Kolombangara, and Allardyce was about to develop logging kauri at Santa Cruz. It had

started to move equipment from Ysabel to a Santa Cruz kauri forest.

After Cyclone Ida, the company ex pected to stop work on Ysabel be fore the end of 1972, but it was able to salvage some timber. It was also possible to get to pockets of timber left standing. Now it expects log exports by Allardyce Lumber Co from Ysabel will continue till the middle of 1973.

The same company is investigating stands of swamp tree which survived the cyclone. If this could be sawn for export it will be taken out. There is still a slight hope that large tracts of timber left on Ysabel can be worked again in a few years.