POTATO FLOUR

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 253, 13 July 1918, Page 8

POTATO FLOUR

: NEW WAK INDUSTRY IN AMERICA. . The building in Idaho Falls City (U.S.A.) of what is-said to be the tat • potato flour mill in the United States has made what is felt by many to be an ■ appropriate setting to this little city of 8000 people, seeing that no loss than twothirds of Southern Idaho's annual crop ; of 7000 care of potatoes is raised in the 70-mile sttetch of productive irrigated land in the upper Snake Eiver Valley, ' in the centre of which Idaho Falls is lo- : cateti That.the.mealy, floury quality of •■ ■ this Idaho potato crop was recognised ',' by Germany a number of years ugo is ' evidenced by the fact that during , the : 30 years, prior to 19H, when shipments i were, of .course, suddenly cut off by the '. war, several million pounds aro declared ' to have been imported into that country for the factories making potato Hour and other potato products litre, which had greatly increased in number during thoso years. ■ A man who had observed this growth in Germany endeavoured to interest capital in the United States with n view to ' the establishment hero of a potato foodproduefs factory, which would help supply the shortage of potato flour nnd from ] which ultimately nn industry might be bnilt up to supplant the imported ar- ! tide'. 'He worked for three years, and finally succeeded in accomplishing his purpose, when ho Interested an Idnho financier who, after being shown statistics as to the imports and'other facts pertaining to the enterprise, started him out with instructions to locate the mill •,' at the point most favourable to steady production of high-grndo potatoes. Such i a locution had already been decided up- ; on during his three years of study and '. investigation, and in October, 1917, theerection of a mill was begun, and the order for the machinery given. By the ' first, of January of this yp;>r the plant ■was ready for tho machinery, which is ■ now installed and readv for operation. : Reducing 32,000 pounds of raw potatoes to "COO pounds of flour every day is the work laid out for this mill. Five ' to ten per cent, of this flour is nil, it is learned, that can be used in a loaf of bread, and such an <imount la paid to make the bread mnro palatable and to keep It longer in good condition. Tn this connection,' it rnk-bt be interesting to Rwedj=h,(iSnyer.nment:ha9 offeifeo ."'foi' ifurnish one-lialf.-, the capital to any.,of its citizens who will erect and "put in , operation potato flour mills. . and from good authority it is learned ■ that this offer is being taken up.