26 



Our Imports of Dairy Produce. 



arrangement continues until the loan is repaid, when the 

 equipment of the creamery is vested in the parties to whom 

 the loan was originally made. 



From this short review of the systems and processes pur- 

 sued in the several countries and colonies which supply the 

 markets of the United Kingdom with dairy produce, it is clear 

 that one feature which is more or less common to them all is 

 the concentration of the manufacture of butter and cheese in 

 large dairies and factories, co-operative or otherwise, drawing 

 their supplies of the raw product from a number of farms 

 situated within a convenient radius. In the greater number 

 of these establishments the whole of the processes of manu- 

 facture are carried out on the premises, but some of them are 

 equipped only for the manipulation of the cream, and in 

 Normandy and Brittany the butter factories confine their 

 operations to the blending and grading of the manufactured 

 product. The object of all is, however, the same, vi^., the 

 production of an article of uniform quality and appearance at 

 the low^est possible cost, and the facts illustrated by our 

 import statistics afford prima facie evidence that the factory 

 system has worked with success abroad, especially in 

 countries where it is combined with co-operative principles, 

 of which Denmark is a notable example. 



In conclusion, attention may be directed to the pro- 

 gress of co-operative dairying in Ireland, a detailed account 

 of which has already appeared in an earlier number of this 

 Journal.* According to the latest report of the Irish Agri- 

 cultural Organisation Society the dairy societies, or 

 creameries, in Ireland now number 93, including ten auxilia- 

 ries or branches, with a total shareholding membership of 

 8,750. The quantity of butter produced by the societies in 

 1896 amounted to 2,791 tons, and the average price realised 

 was 95s. 8d. per cwt. The average price paid for milk 

 supplied by the shareholders was 3.55 pence per gallon. 

 Many of the Irish dairy societies also undertake the pur- 

 chase of farming requisites on behalf of their members. 



* Vol. II., No. I, June, 1895. 



