THE AMERICAN FLOUR TRADE.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 6 October 1880, Page 2

THE AMERICAN FLOUR TRADE.

' The production of wheat flour, like many pther industries, has of late years grown enormously throughout America. Advantage has been widely taken of the great and extensively distributed waterpower. Numerous mills have bean erected and fitted up with the most modern and effective machinery. Besides fully providing for the growing wants of a population of forty-five millions, the exports have been expanded largely. Last year the flour exports of tho, United States to Qreat Britain alone reached 9.863,17& cwt. ; they are double those of 187S; they are four times those of 1877. . This is exclusive, of tho 460,435 cwt. for- '< warded from North British America, ; which has nearly doubled her exports sinoe 1877'- The wheat for grinding is i car&fully selected and cheaply handled,; j | railroads, canals, or rivers, bring it into ! | the mill and take away the' flour ; on through bills of lading, it is cheaply forwarded to European ports ; special agents distribute it throughout this country j and American millers declare that this important industry can be. still further developed, and that flour ean be made in America and forwarded; and sold in Great Britain cheaper than it can be made there. ! Although the latter proposition is untenable,, there is no doubt that the produci ti'on of throughout tho world has I been improved and cheapened by American | invention and skill, while the large surplus supplies both of the State and of Canada notably reduce prices and naryow the profits of British millers,. Owing to shortened fcom Hungary and Austria, many American milk in the spring whoAt States have for two years been turning, o.ut large proportions of th d highly a,lb.uiQenoid patent flour, i The head-quarters of the manufac' /4Ure of American patent flour is Minnea ,p o ]i Sj tho twin capital.of the fertile 0 f Minnesota, where the mighty st /roam 0 £ the Mississippi pours over a prec :^ ce 50ft. high. On either side of the -river the flood has been desects<s into, tunnels .of stone and concrete, and drj[v eg turbine wheels which move saw-milVj and turn out annually Ijso- to. 200 uxillK.in feet of sawn timber, distributed hundreds of miles tobuild settlers' houses an\{ supply the wants of States less bountifully provided with timber. Skill more "<videly distributed is tho fUuy ground V/y twenty-five mills, varying from thvee to eight storeys high; their floors are computed to occupy an area of one and. a quarter million feet, and filled with' superior modern machinery. This milling enterprise has grown rapidly. In 1873 there were but twelve mills, nob worth more than 50,Q00d013. each; now there are twenty-five, valued, at a low estimate at 75,000d.ol&, Four have been, built during 1878. In 1860,- Minneapolis turned out annually 30,000 barrels of flour. Her present producing, powers would almost enable her to do this in two days. With

a little extra effort she cotild ttearfv manage to furnish the 12,000 sacks ( 0 f which are saiH to be •Consumed daily iri London. Her actual daily turn out, when all the mills are workine 12,000 barrels. She ground in 1879'un. wards of 1,500,000 barrels, and of this large produce nearly one-third (422 59a barrels) was exported. The only other place where anything approaching to this business is overtaken is St. Louis, where* the flour produce of 1879 waa upward* L 3,000,000 barrels.—Times. 1