WOOL PRICES.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 9742, 6 March 1914, Page 4

WOOL PRICES.

The fact that the rise in the price of wool at this week's sales will mean an addition of nearly half a million sterling to the wealth of the Dominion should prove a very interesting and pleasing item of news to farmers and tradespeople, while at the same time it serves to emphasise the value of the "golden fleece" as a factor in the progress of New Zealand. The course which wool prices have taken this year has been a somewhat peculiar one. It will be remembered that last year, owing to the big shortage in Australia, there was a strong demand for New Zealand wool and prices reached a very high figure. Then came the lowering of America's tariff walls and the admisvsion of wool free into the United States. It was confidently expected in some quarters that this would not merely hold the prices at the high level which they had reached, but that there would be a further advance. Such was not the case, however, for when this, season's sales opened the American representatives, instead of bidding freely for our wools, studiously avoided participating and for the first sale or two they bought practically nothing. Either they were aiming at securing a reduction of the high rates ruling or else their purchases before the tariff barriers were removed were so large that their needs were supplied for some time to come. The result was that those growers who got their clips on the market early had to bo content with only moderate prices. Fortunately for this province, however, an ill-wiiul blew favourably in this direction. The watersiders' strike generally delayed matters and shearing operations were so hampered that large quantities of wool were held back till the last sales of the season. Then came a welcome and surprising change in the attitude of the Americans. Not only on the local markets but at the London and Antwerp sa'es they dropped their passive attitude and bo 'ame so definitely interested in the proceedings that erossbreds, which are so largely grown in the Wellington province, advanced by 10 per cent, in value, while there was a general increase in other wools. America's wool requirements must steadily increase from now oil with the cheapening of woollen-made goods resulting from the removal of the tariff barrier and this should serve to keep a much higher level of prices than has ruled in the past. There is a most hopeful outlook for the grower in New Zealand.