PHORMIUM FOR TEXTILES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3748, 31 January 1928, Page 3

PHORMIUM FOR TEXTILES.

[Evening Post],

“More leaf, better leaf, and better fibre,” may be said toi represent the aims of those who are working for higher prices and wider uses for New .Zealand flax (phormiuin tenax). The new school of phormiuni cultivators is confident of producing more leaf per acre and per unit of cost, but more leaf does not necessarily mean more fibre, so there is room at the growing end for the science not only of cultivation but of plant-breeding and selection, since in the native state phormium seems to have many variations. But while much may be done for the growing plant, it is at the manufacturing end that the prospect of new conquests has now been opened up, through experiments in Lancashire under the authority of the noted spinner and manufacturer, Sir Amos 'Nelson. Statements by Professor Easter - field and Dr. E. Marsden (Director of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research) indicate that Sir Amos Nelson considers he has produced from phormium a fibre which he hopes to be able to spin successfully for the purposes of cotton and woollen goods. If his experiments, when completed, are successful —“and he does not see why they should not be” —he .should be able to “absorb the whole of the output of New Zealand for the next five years,” provided that New Zealand is able to grow and supply leaf of the required standard. As to the costs at the manufacturing end, these are for the present Sir Amos Nelson’s affair; the costs and quality at the growing end are the affair of New Zealand millers of native flax and of their new rivals the cultivators. This at least is clear —that a great Lancashire spinner sees a reasonable possibility of opening the door to the wider use so long hoped for by friends of phormium. Given a sure place in the textile world, the problem will be no longer over-supply of flax, but how to supply it in sufficient quantities of the required standard. Its permanent place in the new market may depend in part on the volume, regularity, and quality of the supplies, and the task should be attacked industrially, not speculatively. As Professor Easterfield points out, science, is once more intervening in a time of economic need and the result may be an immensely strengthened pillar of the export trade at a time when that trade needs all the support it can obtain.