New opportunities for wool

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32776, 29 November 1971, Page 5

New opportunities for wool

Important new opportunities could be opening up for wool in children’s sleeping wear on the United States market. Many millions of pounds weight of fibre are used in this field, but at present very little of it is wool.

Dr G. Laxer, the director of research and development for the International Wool Secretariat, told a technical conference at the Wool Research Organisation at Lincoln that the Federal Trade Commission in the United States had given notice that such wear for children up to the age of six years was going to have to pass a test for flame resistance or else be labelled “highly dangerous.”

To ensure that the treatment of a fabric used in such a garment was a durable one, Dr Laxer said that the fabric would be laundered 50 times in a washing machine at 60 degrees Celsius, and would then have to pass what was known as a “strip” test. LITTLE WOOL Dr Laxer said that a Czechoslovak scientist with the LW.S. had found that out of about 60m lb of fibre, used in the general field of children’s- sleeping wear, hardly an ounce at present was wool.

It was important, he said, that where a fabric was treated for flame resistance, its aesthetic qualities should not be adversely affected, but with cotton and cotton-poly-ester, which dominated this field, a treatment that would pass the test tended to make the fibre harsh and also produce an allergenic effect. The treatment, involving flame resistance and shrink-proof-ing, was expensive—about 73c per lb—whereas wool could be treated for about a third of that. However, recently it had been claimed that a cheap treatment for cotton and cot-

ton-polyester had been de- . veloped. “The important thing is : that here is an opportunity to get wool into a market that has not existed before to a significant degree, by i use of technology and ensur- ' ing that the fabrics are right i in terms of colour and i style,” said Dr Laxer. In the LW.S. they had to i exploit this opportunity in i the right way, and in the i United States there was a project to get wool into this ' area. i There was also a good I chance, he said, that similar laws would apply to sleeping i

apparel for older people, providing still another opportunity for wool. MATTRESSES Similar rules were also due to be implemented next year for mattresses which were going to have to pass tests for flame resistance. Here Dr Laxer said he could see an opportunity for wool coverings. Already in Australia a firm was producing mattresses with all-wool tickings. The regulations could also extend to the stuffing of the mattress, and for many years wool had be used for this purpose in Italy.