JAPANESE SILK

Evening Star, Issue 21620, 16 January 1934, Page 7

JAPANESE SILK

BOUGHT BY MANCHESTER TO SUPPLY FOREIGN MARKETS. MANCHESTER, January 2. Manchester merchants are now being compelled to buy. Japanese artificial silk fabrics in order to maintain their connections in Eastern markets. This extraordinary fact was revealed by a Manchester shipper. “ We hear a lot about Japanese competition in. cotton,”. he said, “but in comparison with the artificial silk trade the cotton, industry is doing well. Cotton exports have been enormously reduced. Ours have been practically yriped out.” . He produced for inspection a. number of samples of different Japanese fabrics, mainly fully printed art. silk crepe de chine of good quality. He was offered this cloth, with carriage, freight, and insurance paid, for lOd; a yard. It cannot be made in this country under Is lid yard. “ Four years ago,” he added, “we exported great .quantities of these cloths from Britain to such markets as Lagos, Jamaica, Syria, India, and Egypt. They have since been swamped by Japanese goods. To Syria alone 1 used to send £50,000 worth of art. silks a year. To-day I don’t send a pennyworth. Japan has swamped the market at prices wo cannot approach. “In sheer self-preservation I have been compelled to buy Japanese art. silks to supply overseas markets. There are many other Manchester shippers in the same position. We hate to have to handle these cloths, but it means either that or extinction.”