IMPORTANT INDUSTRY

Evening Post, Volume XC, Issue 82, 5 October 1915, Page 10

IMPORTANT INDUSTRY

THE KAURI GLM. ITS DEVELOPMENT. Very great 1 interest is taken by the Prime Minister (the Et. Hon. W. F. Massey) in the kauri gum industry, which of late years has assumed very great importance. Last evening, in moving the second reading of the Kauri Gum Industry Bill, which is framed to foster the industry, he supplied some interesting information. He referred to the temporary set-back the industry had received through the war closing the markets, and to the necessity for seeking and cul tivating new markets in America. There was a considerable quantity of the gum accumulated in the Dominion at present. It was therefore essential that we should get into communication with new purchasers. _ More than half the kauri gum land, said the Prime Minister, was owned by the State, and the time had come when the Government should take such steps in connection with the sale of it as would return the highest prices. Up to the present twenty million pounds' worth of gum had been sold, and an optimistic opinion was that there was another twenty million pounds' worth waiting to be taken from the earth. The industry was, therefore, well worth watching and fostering. There was provision in the Bill for the Superintendent to purchase gum if advisable ; and also to make advances to men engaged in the industry to tide them over until the market was open again.' Another direction in which the State intended to operate was in seeking authority to set aside acres of Crown land for the purpses of digging for the gum 3 and leasing it, though no person is to be allowed to lease more than 3000 acres, and for a period not longer than twenty-one years. An expert had recently stated that 30 gallons of kauri gum oil could be extracted from, a ton of peat, and if that was so, and there was much of this land, the industry was on the verge of unprecedented prosperity. Special penalties were also provided for any damage done to the industry by the lighting of a fire within a kauri gum district. Mr. J. G. Coato* congratnlH(-ed th<i Uoverruuent O n th« Riii w u i,.,,^ „!„,

that a proper grading of the gum be provided for. About half a million pounds' worth of gum was exported annually, and the industry should receive the same consideration as butter and flax. A separate Department should also be created to assist the superintendent. Tlie fact that crude oil- was obtainable from kauri gum land, and that this aspect of the industry was quite in its infancy, was one reason why prompt and energetic action should be taken in the direction he had indicated. Assistance might also be given to men and families to establish homes on the fields. There were no fortunes mado by the diggers. Mr. F. Mander thought that a 50 per cent, advance to the gumdiggeT on his gum, which the Bill proposed, and which the Government had been doing emce the outbreak of the war, was a most excellent thing, but he doubted whether it was sufficient. He congratulated the Government on the introduction of the Bill. Messrs. T. W. Rhodes and C. H. Poole also added their approval. Other speakers followed, and in replying the Prime Minister thanked the j speakers for their expressions of ap- ' proval. " j The Bill was read a second time, con- | sidered in Committee, and reported with a minor amendment to clause 2. <