Wheat & Butter

Off and on for the past year, Canadian politicians have protested loudly about U.S. wheat exports, angrily claiming that U.S. "giveaways" and bargain-price wheat deals were ruining Canada's foreign markets. Last week Canadians found themselves on the receiving end of a similar blast. New Zealand filed an official protest in Ottawa against the dumping of low-priced Canadian butter in Europe, where it is underselling New Zealand butter by 10-c- a Ib.

Canada has made two butter deals in the past few months to export some 9,000,000 Ibs. to Czechoslovakia and East Germany. These were not exactly giveaways, but it was no secret that the deals were uneconomic; the selling price was 39-c- and 40-c- a Ib., one-third less than the support price that the Canadian government pays to the farmers. What hurt the New Zealanders was that they had been selling butter to Czechoslovakia at 50-c-, and making a profit, until the cut-price Canadian butter greased the skids under their market.

Canadian officials tried manfully to defend their embarrassing position. For one thing, they protested that they were unaware that Czechoslovakia was a New Zealand butter customer. Then Canadian Agriculture Minister James Gardiner explained that since such a comparatively small amount of butter was involved, the matter was unimportant. "This is nothing like the wheat situation," said Gardiner. "We've only got about 10 or 12 million Ibs. of butter that we don't need, and we're prepared to take a lower price for it." That was entirely correct--and it was virtually the same explanation that the U.S. gave Canada for underselling Canadian wheat.

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