TALKING WOOL

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 June 1939, Page 10

TALKING WOOL

ORIGIN OF SECRETARIAT WEALTH OF THE DOMINIONS. BENEFITS TO NEW ZEALAND GROWERS. Though the work of the International Wool Secretariat is of direct importance to New Zealand —and not alone to wool growers, for national revenue concerns all —the secretariat, to the majority of New Zealanders, is simply a name. Its objectives are far more widely known in Britain, where it carries on the work of talking wool and selling the wool idea to British and Continental consumers, in the manufacturing, wholesale and retail trades, to the considerable benefit of Dominion growers. In brief this is the story of the setting up of the Wool Secretariat. In January, 1937, there met in Melbourne representatives of the wool growers of South Africa, New Zealand and Australia in order to determine how they might best promote the interests of their industry. At the Melbourne conference it was unanimously decided to establish in London a permanent secretariat to be known as the International Wool Publicity and Research Secretariat, which would have at its disposal the sum of £50,000 "sterling annually, contributed by the three Dominions from statutory levies on all wool exported, in the following proportions: Australia 60 per cent, New Zealand and South Africa approximately 20 per cent. In August, 1937, the International Wool Secretariat was established in London, there being one representative each for Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, Dr I. Clunies Ross, Mr A. F. Du Plessis and Mr F. S. Arthur respectively.

OBJECTIVES AND APPROACH. The objectives of the International Wool Secretariat may be summarised as the furtherance of the interests of the wool industry as a whole by whatever methods are conducive to that end, and not the promotion of Australia, New Zealand or South Africa interests separately, but collectively, and moreover, the interests of British wool growers and manufacturers of other major wool-producing countries. Though the secretariat has not been functioning actively for long the ground work covered during the first year after its establishment in 1937 and the setting out of a clear policy of approach have now brought tangible results; the voice of the secretariat is certainly heard in the great woollen manufacturing trade of Britain. The secretariat has examined those economic trends in the wool industry which may or do affect its future in this or that country; the influence of price fluctuations of the raw materials; the relationship between per capita consumption and wage levels; the directions in which wool is being displaced, etc. Finally, it has endeavoured to classify the fields in which new methods of distribution and marketing or of publicity may be expected to lead to increased consumption of wool. SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH. Within recent years the industry had developed its own research organisation, but it is as yet on a much smaller scale and with resources far from com-’ mensurate with the importance of the industry and the increasing competition which it must face. The secretariat conceive it a vital necessity that they should co-operate to the fullest extent in the work of building up a scientific organisation capable of dealing with every fundamental and applied problem which af - fects the technical efficiency and competitive power of the' wool industry. A study was made of existing wool research organisations in Great Britain and on the Continent in order to determine in what direction scientific assistance could most profitably be employed. It was finally decided that the secretariat should finance a special programme of research at Torridon Wool Industries Research Association Laboratory, Leeds. In addition to the more applied aspects of scientific research, a research fellowship in Wool Chemistry at Cambridge University has been established and two research assistants appointed at Leeds University, one in wool physics and the other in wool chemistry. The whole of the secretariat’s scientific research programme is at present being carried out in Great Britain. This entails an annual expenditure of approximately £12,000.

PUBLICITY IN MANY FORMS. This year the secretariat has set up a special wool development department, which will handle the detailed work of centralising all information and co-ordinating propaganda activities; will provide a source of information for all sections of the wool industry and allied trades and will initiate and control the various propaganda activities undertaken. The wool development department has, for instance, organised a “wool fabric library” of immense interest and importance to manufacturers and traders generally, with a branch library and advisory ! centre at the Paris Bureau. A “creative” division looks after artwork, assistance to individual manufacturers, posters and displays, or even complete designs and layouts for exhibitions in England and abroad. The promotion division of the wool development department has a very wide field of action in ensuring the collaboration of all interested trade associations and individual manufacturers in the promotion of wool and in interesting the consumer public in the wider and newer uses of wool. Special fashion shows have been held in London and Paris, at the Leipzig Fair and at other European fashion centres and the work has been (tarried over the Atlantic by the appointment of an agent in the United States, so that though the getting together of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa in Melbourne in 1937 had not so wide a significance as to appear to warrant the name International Wool Secretariat, the activities have now taken on a true international-im-portance.