WOOL TRADE THREATENED

Evening Star, Issue 20193, 5 June 1929, Page 7

WOOL TRADE THREATENED

STARTLING INCREASES IN SUBSTITUTES DIG ADVERTISING SCHEME PROPOUNDED LSpjjcial to xh* 'Stas.! WELLINGTON, Juno 3.. Changes in the world’s textile industry during the lust ten years augurs badly for the wool trade’s prosperity, and proposals have now been laid before the New _ Zealand Farmers’ Union for the creation of an advertising fund to increase the world’s consumption of wool. The exploitation of rayon,_ tho invention of new manufacturing processes and the use of new textile fibres have contributed to_ a position which is causing Australian wool growers grc. e concern. The world’s wool production has slightly decreased from prewar figures, the 1909-13 average having been 3,286 million pounds, and the 1926 world average being 3,123 million pounds. Estimates of 1927 and 1928 production prepared by the German Economic Bureau, however, _ stand at 3,489 million pounds and 3,536 million pounds, while cotton and rayon figures have been steadily climbing. _ Cotton consumption has been increasing since 1921, this being ascribed to the fact that manufacturers have been successfully combining it with artificial silk and rayon. Startling figures are those dealing with silk production, which rose from 60 in 1913 to 103 millions for 1927, and also for 1928. Rayon has trebled in less than five years. In 1914 it stood at 26 million pounds, in 1922 it was 79 million pounds, in 1926 it totalled 210 million' pounds. Each year tho world production has been rising by over 40 million pounds. In addition, Europe has not yob reached that level of wool production which was hers in pre-war days. Figures show that Europe’s wool clip in 1926 was still 25 per cent, below the level of 1913, and that wool production in tho war-devastated areas alone was 43 per cent, below the pre-war total. With the return to full production in Eui’ope tho world’s total crop will increase by’lo per cent., and with the war-devastated areas supplying their previous quota, the world clip will increase by almost 12 per cent. On top of all this comes tho fact that there is increasing use of shoddy (reused wool), of which Britain imported 59 million pounds in 1926. Therefore the position is causing Australian wool growers to take serious thought. In the United States it is pointed out, there is actually less wool Used to-day than years ago, despite great increases in population and enormously greater spending power. Proposals to meet the feared fail in wool values are numerous. Co-opera-tivo advertising and propaganda to make people more familiar with the advantages of wearing woollen underwear and outerwear, the suggestion that men should bo made more “ clothes conscious,” and encouraged to purchase more suits, the establishment of a central wool bureau in London representing tho wool associations of the producing countries and charged with the development of markets, research, and the discovery of new uses for wool, and also suggestions that steps should be taken to enforce tnio description of clothing imported to countries where a . protective _ tariff exists, this description to aim -at accurate statement of the wool content —all these are set out in tho scheme which has been laid before the New Zealand Farmers’ Union, and is being passed on by it to branches. With reference to the advertising side of the proposed campaign, it is pointed out that the paint industry of tho United States increased the American consumption of paint and varnish by 63 per cent, in less than three years, and that oak flooring 'manufacturers in the same country increased consumption of oak flooring by 800 per cent, in a similar manner. It is considered that the co-operative campaign will be augmented indirectly by manufacturers advertising their own brands of woollen manufactures and by retailers extending their present advertising of their wares. In Australia it is proposed that tho fund shall be started by asking twenty _ leading graziers in each State to subscribe £IOO each. There is aimed at a yearly total of -£75,000 to be spent in tho United Kingdom alone. The total proposed annua! expenditure is £300,000, to bo raised in ' a variety of ways, from 1 per cent, of the commissions of woolbrokers to an export levy of a sum to be determined, on each bale of exported wool New Zoaland’s_ co-opera-tion is being invited, and it is pointed out that both countries arc vitally interested in wool, and that if tho scheme is shelved until the co-opera-tion of every wool-producing country it obtained the campaign may never begin. 1