HAPPY POSITION FOR WOOL-GROWERS

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 94, 15 January 1936, Page 8

HAPPY POSITION FOR WOOL-GROWERS

Effect of Better Prices

OTAGO RETURNS WELL UP ON LAST YEAR

Dominion Special Service.

Dunedin, January 14

The total realisation at the first wool sale of the season iu Dunedin reached ■the sum of £395,020 for a clearance of 28/269 bales, as against £168,017 in December of 1934, when 15,799 bales were sold at auction. An analysis of the figures shows the great improvement in the wool market and the happier position of growers. The average price was 10.17 d, a pound as compared with 7.94 d. in the previous December, while the average for almost a double entry was £l3/19/6 a bale against £lO/12/8. The prices are all the more heartening to the whole of Otago when a comparison is made with the values realised over the whole of the 1934-35 season. ' The averages for the past season were 7.59c1. a pound, and £lO/10/6 a bale. During the series of sales in 1934-35 a total of 75,018 bales was sold in Otago, 6706 being purchased by local mills, the sum realised for the season being £789,530. Next Sale Awaited. An amount equal to just over half of last season’s gross proceeds hag been distributed from the first sale for 193536 and with the continued demand which is world-wide for fine wools an even greater distribution should be made after the next sale here on February 5. A full catalogue of 30,000 bales has been filled since the first sale was held, and the great percentage of the offering will be of back-couptry clips, which hav c a large proportion of fine wools. In fact, there is sufficient wool in Dunedin to fill the March catalogue. The wool has been literally "rolling” into the stores. From December 15 until a week ago about 2000 bales arrived in Dunedin dally by rail in addition to the loads carried by lorries.