POTENTIAL WEALTH IDLE

Evening Star, Issue 23180, 1 February 1939, Page 3

POTENTIAL WEALTH IDLE

MARKETABLE PRODUCT WASTED £5 TO TIPS WITH EVERY TON EXPORT PERMITS REFUSED BY GOVERNMENT Potential wealth for Mew Zealand is lying idle, or is consigned to garbage tips, through the direct action of the Government in refusing to issue export permits. In almost every tip in town where there are tin or canister-making companies lies wasted money, in the form of tin clippings—-worth £4 to £5 a ton in England. Yet the Government desires its exiport trade to become greater. Companies which have realised this waste in other years and have brought moue.y into the Dominion through diverting the now useless products into payable channels have been blocked for some time from converting tin clippings into a marketable product; thereby they and tho country have lost control of what was a good market.

Once there was money in clippings, and in scrap iron, too. Doth have been placed on the forbidden exports list. Yet, it is claimed, there is no logical reason for the withdrawal of permission to. export the former. New Zealand's manufacturing resources are not extensive enough to reclaim the tin coating from the sheets. It requires a much larger plant than can be found in this country. Australia cannot utilise the tin. But there is a market in England. Why, then (it is asked), does not the Government permit exporters to deal in this product?

At one time, when the Japanese war had gained prominence in the thoughts of New Zealanders, the export of tin clippings to that country was prohibited, and rightly so. Also, Spain came under the list to which materials that could be used for armament manufacture were not permitted to be sent. Naturally, the New Zealand Government has no desire to assist warfare. Waterside workers said emphatically that they would not handle scrap metal, both in Australia and New Zealand, where it was consigned to warring countries. (It is, however, still expoited from Australia.) But the persons concerned are at a loss to understand why England should come in the same category as these countries—there is no wai there. If it is a question of armamentmaking, New Zealand is still lacking, for she is dependent upon the Homeland for her defence. What would be more natural than that she should assist England in that direction? United Kingdom manufacturers do not desire the tin dippings for armaments. They are used for ordinary commercial purposes. Treatment such as can be given at Home reclaims tin valuable tin (worth £212 10s a ton) from the scrap metal base, at a payable cost. Other waste products are used in other directions, where scrap metal plays an important part. The United Kingdom buyer is satisfied, and the New Zealand exporter obtains about £5 a ton for a product that cannot be used in the Dominion. This seems a good proposition from all points of yiew. Yet, though local companies have been steadily repeating what seems to be a reasonable demand, the Government refuses to countenance the issue of permits, even to England. T,ons_ of tin clippings go jvery week to ’Now Zealand tips. Waterside workers have no qualms about handling what would appear to be dangerous cargo, with biting edges—tin clippings are packed in drums, the knife edges rendered harmless. Once scrap tin went to Japan; now it stays in New Zealand, useless, filling unsightly gaps in the countryside, losing its value in a few days. Perhaps, with its public works schemes, the Government envisions more land to work or build upon, with the reclamation ofi tip areas through the years. It does seem a costly way of accomplishing this object, though!