SAMOA’S CHIEF CROP.

Shannon News, 24 December 1925, Page 2

SAMOA’S CHIEF CROP.

t ♦ i MECHANICAL COPRA EXTRACTOR | With the view to raising the stand ( urd of the present quality of copr; now produced in E-amoa, even at tli present time second • to none in tli Pacific, Captain B. J. Carter, Connin'sioner of Labour to the Samoan Ad ministration, has for some time pas j been working on a .scheme for splifctin, the cocoanut into any number of 'cqua ■ sections and without waste by a mceh anical process. Such a process will enable tie Natives to extract the meat from t’m nut in large even sections withou "husking” tire cocoanut, thus savin; the native an enormous amount of. tmu and affording him a much greater op portunity of producing a fra' bett-ei grade of copra than is possible at the present juncture. A better grade of copra on the home markets will command a better price for our produce, and if tlie native, receives a fair share of the better prices obtained at home, this is to his personal advantages as well to the general advantage of Samoa. Captain Carter recently returned from New Zealand, where he had been for the purpose of getting a machine properly constructed by a qualified engineer. The machine has come to hand and is now working on Vailele plantation, where a private demonstration woN given on Friday, 13th instant, before His Excellency the Administrator (Sir George Richardson), the Deputy Administrator (Colon'el Hutclion) and other members of the Crown Estates Board of Control. The results obtained were excellent: the machine did all that was asked of it. Each nut was cut into three dean

' sections, without any waste, the meat was removed from the shell in whole * sections in half the time it at present takes, and it was clean and free from • husk or chips of shell. - j It has proved itself to be not only ■ ) a labour-saving device, but one winch [ twill improve the qualify of our copra. ■ | At the trial'great excitement pre- ; [ vailed among the black-boy copra cut- ; tors when they saw the nuts being split, : and one boy put it very aptly when on ( seeing the results he turned to Captain j 'Carter and said: “White man boss lie I / savy too much.” j liis Excellency the Administrator has expressed himself as exceedingly pleased with the results obtained “Samoa Times. ” Mr. H. M. Carter, of the Otaki Railway staff, is a son of Captain Carter.