Mr Marshall Opens Industries Fair

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32073, 22 August 1969, Page 12

Mr Marshall Opens Industries Fair

It was pleasing to see that Canterbury was continuing to attract new industrial development, the Deputy Prime Minister (Mr Marshall) said when opening the New Zealand Industries Fair at Addington last night.

! Mr Marshall said that the| district had the advantages! of cheaper and more readily, !available industrial land, low! building costs and a stable labour force. “But there is more to it than that,” he said. “New industries are coming to Christchurch because—in the modlern form of expression—this •is where it’s happening. “A survey by the New Zealand Manufacturers’ Federa- . tion shows that your sales of ' manufactured goods are up i by 9 per cent, compared with , 7 ner cent for the rest of . New Zealand; forward orders for your factories are up by 7 per cent, compared with a national average of 6 per cent; stocks of finished goods are up by 4 per cent, compared with a national average of only 1 per cent: and your overtime has increased by 7 per cent, as against 6 per I cent for New Zealand.” ■ Projects Praised

After listing a number of new factories and industries established in Canterbury recently, Mr Marshall said there had been some notable engineering achievements in I Christchurch, including the largest boiler and the largest ! machine ever built in New I Zealand. The machine was the roll- ! former corrugating line for the Glenbrook steel mill, iwhich produces corrugated

I iron at the rate of five feet la second and is computerjoperated. He understood this was a !team effort by several companies, Mr Marshall said, and it was a credit to Christchurch engineering as a whole.

Another striking example had been provided by the Christchurch company which had been asked to produce high-speed wheat • loading equipment in the form of giant augurs. The experts had said the job would take eight weeks but the company had it ready in four and a half days. The equipment was used to load a shipment of nearly 14,000 tons, at rates of six to nine tons a minute. Christchurch manufacturers had shown what they could do, and he had no doubt, said Mr Marshall, that they would achieve and eclipse the targets set by the National Development Conference.