232 Agricultural Jouriial of Victoria. 



butter a 10 per cent, examination would suffice. This renders future 

 business possible, and some packers have sold their supplies for the 

 next 12 months to come. Although this system is voluntary, not a 

 single rabbit is exported from Victoria which has not been graded by 

 a Government officer. At outside freezing works we have graders 

 who- are wholly under the control and direction of the Government. 

 Every Monday morning full particulars are secured by me of rabbits 

 received each day for the previous week at all works throughout the 

 State, showing the proportion passed as "large," ''young," or 

 " small," etc., as well as the number rejected and condemned. In 

 addition, weights of grades packed each day are sent. In this way we 

 have a comparison between what is done at outside freezing works 

 and by our graders. In order to complete the check of every grader's 

 work, a certificate is placed in each crate, and purchasers are requested 

 to return it to the Department if the goods do not answer the descrip- 

 tion, together with the defect fully described. This is what has 

 secured the confidence of buyers, so rapidly developed the industry^ 

 and raised the value of our goods. 



Fruit. 



Fresh fruit is bound to figure amongst the perishable exports of the 

 future. The experience of the last three years has affirmed the desira- 

 bility of cooling prior to shipment. The irregularity in condition of 

 some of our shipments on arrival in London is due principally to putting 

 on board consignments at temperatures ranging up to 60 and 70 degrees. 

 In order to cool these large bodies of fruit at so high a tempera- 

 ture, a cold blast below fa-eezing point was turned on with the result 

 that, where the frigid current struck, it became frozen, the necessity 

 for which could have been avoided had it been gradually cooled before 

 shipment. When fruit is placed on board without being previously 

 chilled, the officers are face to face with two very serious difficulties, 

 on the one hand is the danger of freezing portion of the consignment 

 in order to land the bulk in the best condition, and, on the other, 

 shrinkage and over ripeness through insufficient cooling. 



A total of 60,000 cases was exported from Victoria to Great Bri- 

 tain last year, 15,000 of which were packed and cooled at the Govern- 

 ment Cool Stores. Already space in these chambers has been 

 bespoken for over 60,000 cases for next season. The cooling of fruit 

 will enable lower fireights to be secured, and furnish more satisfactory 

 results. 



SUPPLEMENTAKY INDUSTRIES. 



Reference to the export trade would be incomplete without, at any 

 rate, casual mention of the many subsidiary industries that are called 

 into play, prominent among which are saw-milling, box-making, the 

 manufacture of cotton goods, and printing. Half-a-dozen timber 

 factories, employing hundreds of men in making butter boxes, rab- 

 bit crates, and fi-uit cases, are kept going nearly all the year round. 

 Two large factories are in full swing at wrap-making for mutton. 



