Dried Vine Fruits Stabilization Act 1964

Who It Affects

• Fruit growers — the primary beneficiaries. They receive bounty payments if market prices fall short.
• Packers — the businesses that operate packing houses. They collect and pay industry charges, keep records, and are subject to audits and inspections.
• The Minister — has significant power to determine costs of production, average returns, bounty rates, and minimum export prices.
• The Dried Fruits Control Board — must follow the Minister's directions on minimum export prices for fruit covered by this Act.

Limits and Safeguards

• The Act only applies for five seasons: 1964 and the four years following.
• There are caps on how much fruit qualifies for bounty support (e.g., only the first 75,000 tonnes of sultanas received for packing counts toward the bounty calculation).
• The government can set minimum prices for domestic and export sales to prevent growers from being underpaid through artificially low transactions.
• Fraud is a criminal offence: falsely claiming bounty or providing misleading information can result in a fine of £500 or 12 months' imprisonment, plus repayment of any bounty wrongly received.
• Inspectors can access packing houses, books, and records at any time.

Why It Matters

This law reflects mid-20th century Australian agricultural policy — using government funds and industry levies to stabilise incomes in export-dependent farming sectors. It gave dried fruit growers confidence to keep producing during the 1964–1968 period without fear that a bad market year would wipe out their livelihoods.