Australians Had A Good Year

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30636, 30 December 1964, Page 9

Australians Had A Good Year

(Special Crspdt. N.Z.P.A.) SYDNEY, Dec. 29. With the New Year only a matter of hours away, Australians, like people throughout the world, are in a contemplative mood. Most seem to agree that 1964 has been a kindly year to Australians. But a cloud on the economic front has been the dramatic recent drop in overseas

wool-sales receipts. Although th? return for wool does not now figure quite so prominently on a percentage basis in Australia’s overseas earnings as the same commodity does in New Zealand, it is still a heavy contributor and any dramatic loss such as just experienced can have serious repercussions. In the last five months the drop has been 8 per cent in weight of wool exported and 15 per cent in value over the figures for the comparable months in 1963. This represented a monetary loss of £32m. Some experts attribute the

drop in exports and cash to temporary causes such as the high prices of wool early in the season, but others say the most significant reason is the increasing competition wool is meeting from synthetics. Figures show that Japan, at one stage rapidly overhauling Britain as the chief importer of wool, imported 12 per cent less wool in the last year; the British figure was down by 4 per cent On the brighter side of the country’s commerce are the vast deals made in recent weeks for the export of iron ore from Western Australia to Japan, and of coal from

Queensland to Japan to help in the processing of the West Australian ore to steel. Another bright prospect is in the rapidly-increasing search for commercial oil fields. Already, Australia has a commercial field in Queensland and has discovered others in widely scattered areas of the continent which could prove to be payers. In the next few days drilling is to start off the Victorian coastline of Australia’s first off-shore oil exploration well. At least five others are scheduled to be drilled in the first half of the New Year.