GENERAL

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 15, 11 April 1907, Page 28

GENERAL

Poultry and Eggs ' ' - During the year 1906, Great Britain imported poultry and eggs to the value of £7,91)7,254. Irish supplies represented £2,800,000 of this sum. Compared with the exports from' Ireland 1832, when, they amounted to only £.182,500, there appears an increase in the value of shipments of poultry produce from Ireland 'of £2,b±/,500 in a iiotie o<ver seventy years, n xais rate of increase in the exports of poultry anid eggs should continue lor the next ten or twelve years, .uuis 'branch of Ireland's commerce will out-distance the present export trade in butter-, which last year amounted to £3,195,015, and has always been 'considered one of Ireland's chief industries. . , Irish Lace At a recent meeting of the Congested Districts Commission Mr. J. D. WaLker, Industries Inspector, gave some rni/erestiivg evidence regarding) the earnings of lace-workers. He stated that it has been found that the supply of superior qualities of lace had tended to produce an increased demand. Ten- years ago there was neither demand for, nor the supply of, lace which existed at present, i'he turn-over oi the Irish JLace uepot, lor instance, najd increased. Irom £5000 per year ten years since, to £34,000 last year; and, beside the Lace Depot, tnere were now a considerable number of wholesale purchasers who do a large trade. Continuing, witness" said, for a number of years the Irish Lace Depot took the' buui of the work produced. The Board's classes, however, take orders from- any wholesale buyers, the only instructions to traders being that the patterns of one firm were not to be sold to another. In practise it generally followed that Mie bulk: ot the produce of any one class goes to one -firm, which usually keeps * the class constantly employed. There were last year 53 classes established by the Board in various partsof the country districts engaged in the production of lace and embroidery, from which the total earnings paid to workers amounted to £21,580. The laces produced were crochet, guipure, applique, Limerick, needlepoint, and renaissance lace. 'Hie latter is sow under the name of Connemara-* curtains.