asked the Minister for Agriculture if he will state what will be the deduction from the basic price fixed for home-grown wheat of the 1958 harvest if output is estimated at (a) 3,250,000, (b) 3,500,000, and (c) 3,750,000 barrels.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Price of Home-Grown Wheat.
I assume that the Deputy refers to the quantities of green wheat likely to be delivered to the mills from the 1958 crop.
In the Press Notice issued on the 16th January last it was stated that, if wheat production in 1958 were the same as in 1957, the estimated deduction would be of the order of 6/- a barrel. The quantity of wheat of the 1957 crop delivered to millers is approximately that referred to at (a) in the Deputy's question. Accordingly, the deduction under (a) would be about 6/- a barrel.
The estimated deductions appropriate to the delivery figures quoted at (b) and (c) are 8/9 and 11/- a barrel, respectively. These estimates are based on the following assumptions:— (1) that the home market for animal feed will be able to absorb some 40,000 tons of the surplus at prices comparable with those ruling for alternative feeding grains; and (2) that the prices realised for whatever quantity it may be necessary to export will be in line with those ruling at the present time.
Am I to assume that if the excess exported or sold as animal feed on the domestic market should yield a lower price than the price currently obtaining for coarse grains, the basic price payable for the total wheat crop would be further reduced?
The Deputy can base his calculations on all kinds of assumptions.
I am purely dealing with the Minister's answer.
He cannot base his calculations on election promises, whatever.
I am delighted to discover in this House so many advocates for the grain grower.
The Minister spoke of the contingency arising. In the event of surplus wheat not realising on the domestic market the current price of coarse grains, or on the export market not realising the current price for imported coarse grains, some contingency would arise. Am I to understand that any unanticipated loss in respect of these transactions would be reflected in the price payable for the wheat crop as a whole?
These calculations that I have made are based on the only figures that were fair on which to base a calculation, that is, the figures of the present time. What next year will be like is a matter that I cannot foretell. However, I can at least say this, even though there must be an element of doubt in such matters, regarding the price at which other coarse grain is available to millers and compounders, it is a safe assumption that the price at which surplus wheat would be sold to compounders would have to have a relation to the price of other coarse grains. Therefore, if we are to assume that the compounders and feeders here could absorb, say, 40,000 tons of any surplus wheat we might have, which would be in line with the estimate for the present year, then there could not be very much difference between the amount realised in respect of the wheat so disposed of and the amount which will be realised this year. As to what any wheat would make in the foreign market, if any wheat should have to be sold outside the country, the price now is so low that, though it is not impossible, it does not look very likely that it could be still lower.