The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 1913. WOOL FOR AMERICA.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 12, 13 January 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 1913. WOOL FOR AMERICA.

America’s textile trade is dealt with by an expert in ‘The Financial Times,’ the writer maintaining that this industry in the United States no longer figures in an insignificant way in this branch of the world’s trade, and while no definite details are available showing the number of spindles which are being turned in the woollen, worsted, hosiery, cotton, and allied trades in America, the progress made in millbuilding during the past twenty years jis most remarkable. Great Britain and the Continent have, to a large extent, accommodated themselves to the high protective duties of America and recovered from the blow which previous high tariffs inflicted. During the past few years the whole of the textile industry of Great Britain has enjoyed a period of prosperity, and, singularly, notwithstanding that the United States was once the most valuable market to Bradford, it is stated that more spindles and looms are running today*, and more wool being actually consumed than at any previous time in the history of Yorkshire trade. The ‘Mercantile Gazette,’ dealing with this aspect, says the important part which America is playing as a competitor for wool in the world’s markets cannot be overlooked. The high Dingley tariff of 1897 was expected to resuscitate

the sheep-breeding industry of the United States, bnt it has done very little towards achieving that object, and American sheep stocks are not so large to-day as they were some years ago. The expectation that the amount of wool placed on the markets by United States sheep-breeders each year would bo sufficient to satisfy the demands ol American manufacturers has not been fulfilled, and New England mills must look to the British Colonies and England for a fair proportion of supplies; and they are seeking lor those supplies in Australasia. The presence of American buyers at a sale has a stimulating effect, and the day was when their very appearance meant a rise of a penny per lb. America is even now a good customer for colonial wool. The revision of duties and expected modification of the American tariff on wool which the election of Dr. Woodrow Wilson to the Presidency of the United States makes possible, will tend towards a further large trade, and it is contended that such revised duties ought to he such as to induce United States manufacturers to come into the London. Bradford, Australasian, and Cape markets, and buy the second and third rate wools which are so largely used by English and Continental manufacturers in the production of wool wearing

materials, and which American mills have so far been debarred from using.

So far as the present wool season is concerned, American buyers have been operating freely in .New Zealand, both privately and at the sales which have been held in the Dominion, notwithstanding the high tariff 'fthich sail exists.