Sweetener for RHA?
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THE ROAD Haulage Association has appealed to Agriculture Minister Peter Walker to oppose EEC proposals for a cut in Britain's sugar beet production.
RHA says it joins with the National Farmer's Union and such other organisations as the British Sugar Corporation and growers representatives in expressing concern about the EEC proposals.
The EEC wants Britain to reduce its white sugar beet growing area by 125,000 acres and for the British Sugar Corporation to close eight factories.
RHA points out that this reduction would mean a considerable drop in the amount of work for hauliers engaged in beet hauling from the farms to the factories, mainly in the Eastern and East Midlands RHA areas.
This drop in beet haulage would also have repercussions on the transport of other types of products. Since beet is highly seasonal, its haulage is invariably linked with that of other mainly agricultural products and so these would suffer an inevitable rate increase as the hauliers sought to make up for the loss of the beet traffic.
The RHA's letter finishes with the plea: "This Association therefore urges the Government's opposition to any reduction in the quota of the amount of sugar beet that this country can produce."