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1 Juny, 1898.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL, — 21 
of the disabilities of farmers in the matter of marketing, they had themselves 
to blame. Bulk lots were not always up to sample, and this made dealers and 
buyers suspicious. In co-operative societies he held that no non-producers 
should be shareholders, and he considered the idea of distributing the profits on 
the value of the produce supplied a very good one. 
Mr. J. G. Panursorpr (Toowoomba) said there were many causes for 
the depression in prices. Many people were not strong enough, financially, to 
hold out with their produce till prices were better. Farmers would get into 
the books of business people during bad seasons; then came a good crop, and 
the growers had to realise at once in order to pay off their indebtedness. 
When some institutions saw farmers could pay outstanding accounts by selling 
their crop, they often insisted on their ‘doing it at once, and this was one of - 
the causes that had a great deal to do with the marked differences in the values 
of farm produce. After referring to the storage of wheat (and in this 
connection he considered trouble and loss could be minimised by the action of 
the farmer), the speaker suggested that more care be bestowed on the getting 
up of agricultural produce for market. He often bought chaff full of stones, 
manure, &c., and of course such a condition of things was unsatisfactory. If 
a grower saw the way in which certain articles of produce were landed in Bris- 
bane from New Zealand, he would easily understand how these things sold 
better, as a rule, than the Queensland articles. Still, matters, in this con- 
nection, were improving in the colony. 
Mr. O’Kurrr (Laidley), in reply to the remarks on his paper, maintained 
that auctioneers, as such, ran no risk whatever in the sale of produce. It was 
only when the auctioneer became a dealer that he incurred risks. If an 
auctioneer followed his legitimate business, he should. not purchase at all, and 
then he would not have to complain of his risks. Jf£ the auctioneer confined 
himself to that business he would be the last to ask to have him done away 
with, as he considered the auction system an excellent one for the disposal of 
agricultural produce. Abuses, however, crept in, and this was the cause of - 
many of the objections to the auctioneer. It was because he was a dealer, 
because he bought what he should only sell. Various gentlemen had made 
remarks about their experience in a certain farmers’ agency society, but in the 
first place it ought to be remembered that the remarks all dealt with one 
particular society; and as accounts of the fate of this society had done much to 
hinder the spread of the principles of co-operation in the colony, he might be 
pardoned for speaking a few words additional to what had been said on the 
subject. In the first place, that business was not a farmers’ co-operation. It 
was not carried out by farmers for farmers. He did not know that farmers 
started it. A gentleman sold his business. out at a satisfactory figure to 
what was to be the so-called co-operation, and canvassers were sent 
round to get farmers to subscribe to it. He himself took it for granted 
it was going to be a farmers’ co-operation, and took some shares, but after 
that he could never get anything definite about the concern. It was 
worked by men who had never been farmers, and he desired to know 
whether the whole history of the society was a fair criterion of the operations 
of co-operation in practice. He considered the principles of co-operation were 
the soundest afarmer could takeup. Farmersas a rule had not much business 
training, and through their isolated position never had opportunity for obtain- 
ing such, but they could be educated gradually. It would be a mistake to 
establish a huge co-operation at one step, but small societies could be formed 
at first. He had not said in his paper the middleman should be extinguished, 
They had to have him, but he should be kept in his right place. When lately 
at Brisbane he saw a first-class sample of chaff knocked down at £3 17s. 6d. ~ 
per ton. Immediately afterwards a second-class sample fetched £5 18s, He 
asked a bystander, an auctioneer, if this was legitimate business. The re ly 
was, “Look at the purchaser of the second lot, a man who should buy his 
chaff over a retail counter.’ They could understand the drift of the thing. 
The purchaser was a poor cabman, perhaps, and the dealers in the market had 
