NEWS AND NOTES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2635, 20 September 1923, Page 1

NEWS AND NOTES.

Sargents Limited, the great feeders of Sydney’s moalors-onf, reports a net prolif for Hie June halfyear of £4,031, or £S,(i(io less Ilian in I lie previous half-year, the decline being ascribed to the prices charged for meals, and increases in rents, wages, and taxes. Another reason, not staled (says the Sydney correspondent of tin l Melbourne Age), appears to be the many extensions that have been made during the last 12 months. But Sargents will not starve. They have pienly of property and solid reserves. This is one of the big oaks that so surprisingly grow from little aeorns. The original Sargents was a little shop in which pies made by Sargent pore were sold —pies so excellent that a demand grew for them which in time had to be satisfied by full meal shops, li>h shops, and so on. Now the big linn has almost a monopoly of its particular kind of listanranls, and can afford the £1,001) which it has had to take from equalisation reserve in order to pay its .10 per cent, per annum i his 1 imo.

The wealtli that a nation can derive from a systematic exploitation oi its fisheries is (dearly evidenced in a recent report issued by the Bureau of Fisheries at Washington, dealing with the canning of lish in the United States daring Ihe year of 1022. In that year salmon alone tot tilling 5,234,898 eases, valued at 38,420,000 dollars, were packed, representing an increase of 54.4 per cent, in the quantify and 33.1 per cent, in value over the previous year. The increase was due to new large scale operations in the salmon fisheries of America’s great

“Xorthern Territory,” Alaska. In two States, California and Maine, which have the largest sardine fisheries in that country, the pack of funned sardines totalled 2,504,857 eases, valued at 9,111,000 dollars. This shows an increase over last year of 53 per cent, in the quantity packed and 44 per cent, in the value of the pack, due to the influx of new capital into the California sardine packing industry. From lish, which is used in the production of fertiliser and oils 0,120,591 dollars were derived, representing an increase of 53 per cent, over 1921. The bureau’s report does not give the total figures for the catch of fresh fish nor for the pack of other tinned fish less popular than sardines and salmon, such as the tuna, mackerel, cod, etc., but indicates that the value of the products from these branches of the fishing industry are very great.