Manawatu Herald TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1918. THE HEMP INDUSTRY—A SERIOUS OUTLOOK.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XL, Issue 1788, 12 February 1918, Page 2

Manawatu Herald TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1918. THE HEMP INDUSTRY—A SERIOUS OUTLOOK.

WE believe hemp ranks about fifth on the list of the Dominion’s exports. The war has caused an increased demand for fibre, followed by a rise in price, and despite the scarcity of shipping, merchants have operated freely, and the millers and those connected with the industrial side, together with the State, have all benefitted in proportion. 1 Producers have spent thousands of pounds in providing more expeditious means of converting the green blade into the “press hank.” The industrial side of the question has not of late caused any great anxiety —indeed, the employees in this industry may be classed among the highest paid unskilled labourers in the Avorld. But this important industry is threatened with disaster, for Nature has taken a hand in the game, and .has decreed that if her laws governing the growth of the plant are violated, then the flax must perish. It is for scientific experts to discover what natural laws have been violated, and to assist Nature in the growth of the plant. While the ground remained in its natural state, the flax - grew and flourished. When the swamps were grained of surface .water the ground sunk, and the lungs of the plant became exposed, at certain seasons of the year, to the ravages of insects or grubs, which attacked the tender shoots and riddled the fibre. These insects, or grubs, were the natural food of swamp birds. But we introduced stoats and wcasles into this country to deal with the rabbit pest, The stoats and weasles

preferred a diet of pukaka and wood lien, and as the swamps became drier it gave them easy access to the haunts of the feathered tribe, until now in some of the swamps scarcely a pukaka or a wood hen are to be seen, but stoats and weasles have increased and multiplied therein, as have bugs and insects which attack the flax. Do these points throw any light on the subject? We stated that the drainage of the swamps had exposed the lungs of the plant. The surface water has gone, and now a fungoid growth, or blight, has fastened upon the plant, which causes the matured leaves to wither and die, but the disease does not, in every case, kill the plant outright, as numerous small buds may be seen on plants attacked again sprouting forth. Of course, we can only speculate on this subject, and our observations may be wide of the mark. Still the vital point is that the plants are threatened with destruction, and unless some remedy is soon discovered there will not be sufficient millable flax in the district to keep more than haf-a-dozen strippers going.