COLONIAL INDUSTRIES.

Otago Witness, Volume 25, Issue 1004, 25 February 1871, Page 2

COLONIAL INDUSTRIES.

Whilst political questions have "been absorbing the whole attention of the public, an enterprise has been started in the province which may very probably have as much influence upon its future as any of the subjects which have been so hotly discussed at the hustings and elsewhere. The art -of converting the surplus live stock of the country into food for distant populations, and thus adding a most important item to the list of our exports, though not new in itself, is new to Otago, and the thanks of the whole community are due to those who have been the pioneers in introducing it here. It is some time since the Meat Preserving Factory at Woodlands in Southland was brought into operation, and in Canterbury a Meat Export Company has been even longer at work. But it is only within the last few weeks this important manufacture has been commenced within the boundaries of this province as they stood before the j re-union with Southland. The fact is hardly creditable to this boastful community, which ought to be beforehand with every enterprise of this sort. The delay, however, is now to be compensated for. The private company which established the Woodlands Factory has just extended its operations by making a start at meat preserving at Kakanui; and the Otago Meat Preserving Company is, we understand, to commence work at Green Island during the course of the week. We have an example in this case of the value of Government patronage of * new industries.' Whilst the Provincial Government of Otago has been advertising liberal rewards for the establishment of a woollen factory, for the jnaßufaetur« of rope, or of paper, from New Zealand flax, and so forth, Hwa oi a wore practical tarn

of mind "were conceiving and preparing for an enterprise of infinitely more value to the country. None of our loquacious patriots appear to have thought of meat preserving or the manufacture of tallow, as matters of the slightest importance to the country. If a man should have a money prize for making twenty tons of inferior rope out of native flax, simply because he is the first man who does so in Otago, why should not the man who first boiled down sheep into an article of export be equally encouraged ? For a pound weight of rope that we are likely to secure customers tor, we may calculate on a market for a thousand tons of tallow. For a yard of Otago-made tweed that any one is likely to wear, -we may hope to see ten thousand tins of preserved meat purchased from us at a price which will save the stock-owner from ruin. For a sheet of brittle flax-made paper that would find a market, a hundred times its value in the mere etceteras produced in a Meat Preserving Factory will be turned into cash. This is the practical view of the matter. Our theoretical nolitioians are so far sighted

p that they cannot see things that lie beneath their eyes. Hence everything that is chimerical and foolish is eagerly talked about and patted on the back, whilst that which is really useful is left to struggle with all those difficulties which attend the attempt to establish any new industry at a great distance from the ordinary seats of manufacturing enterprise. As things stand at present it is extremely doubtful whether even the Flax industry is of as much importance to the country as Meat Preserving. A very large part of the capital of the colony, and a full majority of our population, are already chiefly employed in the production of live stock. Wool, which has met a falling market for some time past, has hitherto been the only item of export worth mentioning which this capital, and this large section of the community, have produced for us= Year after year, the carcases of oxen and sheep have been falling in value, until of late serioua distress has fallen on a great number of persons who had been accustomed to find an outlet for their stock in the meat market. The only remedy for this state of things which our paternal Government appears to have been able to devise, was the project of establishing a Woollen Factory. It may probably appear strange to the uninstructed, that we cannot profitably manufacture our own wool, but must send it home in its raw state, and carry it back in its manufactured condition to and from a country distant by half the globe ; a little reflection upon the hundred varieties of woollen fabrics which are imported, and the smallgross total of the money value of them all put together, ought to explain why we cannot as yet profitably convert the raw material we produce so plentifully into the various woollen articles which find sale amongst us. It would need more than a score of factories to produce what we require in this way, whilst the whole quantity consumed would barely suffice to enable one to be conducted profitably. Quite different is the case with meat preserving. Here it is no longer the limited colonial market we provide for, but the vast populations forming the older civilised communities, who are no longer able to provide from the . soil on which they live sufficient sustenance for themselves. The market may almost be spoken of !as unlimited, so long as we can manufacture an article that will suit it at a sufficiently low price. In the meantime, a few meat preserving factories, whilst they do far more to assist the producer of live stock "than the same number of woollen factories would, employ ten times the number of persons in proportion to the capital involved, and the gross value of the article manufactured. In every way, therefore, the industry which has been' unobtrusively established by private enterprise, is of more importance than any, or all, those which our talkative patriots have volunteered to patronise.

A spectacle manufactory at New Haven, Conn., is Baid to bo the moßt extensive in the world. The company mwtfswtnrw Annually 300,000 pairi,