Anniversary of frozen meat shipment celebrated

The 120th anniversary of the first shipment of frozen meat to Britain has been celebrated in North Otago.

The Totara Estate south of Oamaru, where the first meat was prepared, turned on tours, traditional trade demonstrations and a vintage machinery display.

Speakers at the function included Minister of Agriculture Jim Sutton, Associate Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Judith Tizard, Historic Places Trust chief executive Dr Bill Tramposch and John Acland of Meat New Zealand.

Meat New Zealand said it would donate $226,000 to preserve the estate's slaughterhouse, granary, stables and carcass shed.

The nation's economy was tranformed by the advent of refrigerated shipping in 1882.

Until then, sheep carcasses had largely been a waste product in the production of wool for export.

In some cases, farmers would drive sheep off cliffs to dispose of them, because there was no way market the meat.

In 1879, an Australian venture successfully used dry air as a refrigerant, and a director of the New Zealand and Australian Land Company, Thomas Brydone, arranged to fit out the Shaw Savill and Albion sailing ship Dunedin with freezers.

When the ship arrived at Port Chalmers in November 1881, killing parties at the Totara Estate, 112km away, slaughtered 250 sheep a day, railed them to the ship and froze the carcasses.

The ship sailed on February 15, 1882, with 4311 sheep and 598 lambs.

- NZPA