NEW STATE MILL

Waikato Times, Volume 122, Issue 20501, 18 May 1938, Page 8

NEW STATE MILL

ROTORUA ENTERPRISE CAPITAL COST OF £IOO,OOO USE OF FORESTRY AREAS (By Telegraph.—Press Assocletlon) ROTORUA, Wednesday A statement that the site had been selected and plans completed for the erection of a State mill at Whakarewarewa, near Rotorua, was made by the Commissioner of State Forests, the Hon. F. Langstone, in an interview yesterday. The Minister stated that the mill would be utilised for general forest utilisation purposes and would manufacture fruit boxes, crates and cases in addition to creosoted posts and poles. The capital cost of the mill, for which machinery was on order, would be in the vicinity of £IOO,OOO and it would be entirely a State undertaking. The forest areas to be utilised were all State-planted and it was, therefore, most suitable that they should be used to supply a State enterprise of this nature. Mr Langstone emphasised that the operations of the mill would be conducted in conjunction with the intelligent policy of rotational planting which would ensure a continuous supply of timber for the mill. He added that his department was insisting upon a better system of forest management and claimed that this had already done a great deal to protect and preserve the diminishing kauri forests in the north. Creosoted Posts Output Under this policy the department was itself selecting the millable trees and delivering them to millers at suitable points instead of selling whole sfands of trees, as had been done in the past. This policy was also being applied to the rimu and matai forests under State control in the Urewera Country. Mr Langstone said that the output of creosoted posts from the Whakarewarewa mill during the first year of operation would be in the vicinity of 250,000 and thereafter it was hoped to increase it to half-a-million posts annually. The mill should be in operation by the end of the present year or the beginning of next.