A NEW INDUSTRY

Feilding Star, Volume 5, Issue 991, 5 January 1927, Page 7

A NEW INDUSTRY

PRODUCTS FROM SHARKS. PLANS FOR THE DOMINION*. END LIS fl COMPANY’S OPERATIONS. Now Zealand is shortly to see a now industry that will depend upon, sharks for its produets, according to Mr Alfred Ehrenreich, F.R.G.S., the greatest living authority on sharks, who arrived from Vancouver by the Aorangi. , Dr. Ehrenreich, who is .managing director of the English firm, Marine Products, Limited, is a doctor o! sen; ence, aiid a member of the A indie an Academy of Science. l as .wed as . a member of many other scientific bodies 1 Dr. Ehrenreich said lie had studied sharks and their habits for 20 years and although he had never before been in New: Zealand he knew exactly the kind of fish inhabiting our waters. He had come to the Dominion with the idea of opening up works here for* making use of shark products. Products from sharks included leather, fertiliser, valuable oil, glue, and a substance from the pancreatic gland for medicinal purposes. _ • : “I hope to have factories established in New: Zealand in a year’s time, and our aim is to catch 10CO sharks a day,” stated Dr. Ehrenreich. “This is an industry- that has progressed wonderfully in other parts of the world and these waters abound with fish.” I In describing . the methods of catching that would be employed by the company; Dr. Ehrenreich safcl the fish would be taken in nets and drowned. There w;;is no fear, as in the ease of whales, of killing off all the sh'arks. The more sharks that were caught the more they would breed. At certain stages of tliier lives they were cannibals and killed each other off in enormous numbers. Dr. Ehrenreich will remain in New, Zealand for a few r weeks and will then proceed to Australia. ,