INDUSTRIAL NOTES.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 1035, 16 May 1883, Page 2

INDUSTRIAL NOTES.

A Frozen Meat Company is likely to bo started in Marlborough. The Blenheim Times says that substantial promises of support amounting to several hundreds of pounds have been made From, New Zealand alone 8,500,000 rabbit skins were sent to England in 1880. These skins are in demand by the furriers. Such skins as are not dyed and used as furs, are, after the hair has been pulled off for the hatmaker and for stuffing beds, employed for glove making. The hair is also now used for making yarn and doth. For some six or seven years theMataura Paper Mills have been in active operation. They are situated on the banks of the Mataura river, a short distance from the. town of that name. The other day we were shown over the mills by the manager, Mr Gilmour, and the foreman, MrLoudan, and watched with interest the process of paper making. We were shown the raw material in the shape of rags, waste paper, tussock and tow, and the different stages through which the material passed until it came out in sheets of white wrapping paper. The process is a most interesting one, and were it not that the subject has already been I ■ • 1 t _ v-j-^lvrav«.-s. we should be templed to describe it in all its details. For some time past the management has been endeavouring to turn out white printing paper, bnt owing to the absence of the necessary chemicals their efforts did not meet with any great success. Printing paper has been manufactured, but not of sufficiently fine texture or clean appearance to satisfy the enterprising directory. A final effort was made on Friday last, but with little greater success than upon previous occasions. We are sorry to learn that for the present the directory think it unwise to make any further experiments in this direction with the plant and appliances at their command, and will content themselves with turning out wrapping and other classes of paper. We trust, however, that the time will soon come when the business of the company shall have so much increased as to warrant some further expenditure on the necessary plant, and that then another attempt will be made to produce printing paper, an article for which there should be a very large demand in the colony.— Mataura Ensign. A specimen bar of the Onehunga iron has been tested at the Canterbury foundry, the result being that Mr Anderson declared it in every way a high-class iron, in his opinion superior to the ordinary imported iron. The tests applied to it were twisting, bending, and punching, all of which resulted satisfactorily. An Auckland correspondent writes : A strenuous effort is being made here, by the formation of a fiuit-growets’ association, to put a stop to heavy importations of fruit from Tasmania and elsewhere. Attention will be given principally to apples, which it is believed can, by the co operative system, be placed on the market (in cases) at a seling rate of Id per lb. The display of this class of fruit at the late horticultural show was simply magnificent, and experts declared that they had seen nothing better at exhibitions in London and on (he Continent. That our local fruit-growers have hitherto suffered from foreign importations is solely owing to the want of combination and enterprise, certainly not through any disadvantage of soil or climate. The other week I went through a country orchard in which nearlj" 600 varieties of apples were being grown, but the cattle and pigs on the farm adjacent were the most largely interested in the consumption of the produce. The Tasmanian fruit-growers declare their ability to land apples in the Auckland market at Id per lb, and still secure a profit, so that the contest between the local growers and tho importers is likely to be a keen one. A Nelson paper says Mr Joshua Johns has purchased the business of Mr Samuel Carter, at Motueka. Mr Johns is importing a quantity of machinery, and intends to go into the jam making on a more extensive scale than it has hitherto been carried on at the Motueka factory. The prospectus of the Auckland Tobacco Company (Limited) is published. The proposed Company, with a capital of £SOOO in as many shares, is intended to take over and extend the business of the Auckland Tobacco Growing Association, which baa been in existence for nearly a year past. This is n movement of the first importance to the whole of North New Zealand, as opening up a new and profitable industry for settlers, especially in the country north of Auckland. The Tobacco Growing Association : having secured some land at Pahi, Kaipara, with a right to purchase 212 acres, have raised an experimental crop of tobacco with most marked success. The South Canterbury Industrial Association are collecting information with a view

to establishing the fishing industry and also the manufacture of farina. At the last meeting the subject of a paper mill was introduced, and the Secretary read a few statistic and details of its probable cost. During the discussion it was shown that this industry, besides being a profitable one, vyould promote half-a-dozen others, each giving constant employment to those engaged in them. The Secretary was instructed to collect,all information possible on the subject, to be laid before the next general meeting.