A new drive to stamp out racketeering in the live poultry industry of the Northeastern States to supplement efforts now being made in New York live poultry markets has been initiated by Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace.
A public hearing on a proposed code of fair competition for the live poultry industry in New Jersey, the metropolitan area of Philadelphia and the metropolitan areas of Boston and Providence has been scheduled by Secretary Wallace for December 7 at the Hotel New Yorker in New York. Elimination of unfair trade practices and rackets which have detrimental effects on producers, consumers and members of the poultry trade is sought. A large percentage of the live poultry in the three market areas is sold for kosher slaughter.
POULTRY DEALERS BACK CODE
The proposed code is sponsored by the New Jersey Poultry Dealers Association, the Retail Live Poultry Dealers Protective Association of Philadelphia and the Greater Boston Live Poultry Slaughterhousemen’s Association. All persons engaged in the business of selling, purchasing for resale, handling or slaughtering live poultry, to the time the poultry is first sold in slaughtered form, and such related branches of the industry as may later be included by amendment to the code, would come under its provisions.
Persons solely engaged in the transportation of live poultry would be exempt. Estimates made by the trade indicate that around 850 firms would be subject to the code.
WOULD GOVERN HOURS, WAGES
Containing provisions aimed at correction of unfair trade practices and racketeering similar to those in the live poultry code now in effect for the metropolitan area of New York, this regional code would include an industry which annually handles in excess of 75,000,000 pounds of live poultry with a wholesale value of more than $13,000,000. The New York live poultry code includes an industry which handles in excess of 190,000,000 pounds of live poultry valued at about $30,000,000.
In addition to trade practice provisions, which would be under jurisdiction of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, the proposed code contains provisions governing conditions of labor, hours and wages which would be under the jurisdiction of the National Recovery Administration.
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