Our Mineral Resources.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XVIII, Issue 1713, 29 July 1885, Page 2

Our Mineral Resources.

There were some points in the statements recently made by the Minister for Mines in Parliament which ' passing notice. AUb«-^ 11 tne colony is yet in its infancy compared to Australia and Tasmania, we have already extracted from below the earth’s service equal to 10,016,196 ounces of gold, of the value of £41,634,507 sterling, which wa had exported previous to the 31st March last, together with 447.923 ounces of silver, value £115,154 ; 0 tons silver ore, value £9OO ; 75 tons copper ore, value £I3OO ; 37 tons copper, value £ll7O ; 123 tons antimony, value £2340 ; 11,421 tons manganese, value £41,386 ; 15 tons zinc, value £259 ; 18 tons sulphur, value £IOB ; 4 ton hematite, value £l2 ; 7888 tons other minerals not specified, value £33,925 ; 61,520 tons of coal, value £51,043 —total, 81,1031 tons, value £247,587 —making a total value, at the end of the financial year, of mineral exports of £41,882,094. And this is only a tithe of onr mineral wealth - for all practical purposes a mere sample of what in the future may be done. We should keep before us the fact that the industrial aspect of a district may be entirely changed by the discovery of a new ore, and lessening the coat of producing any valuable mineral by a small figure per ton may increase its application in manifold ways. Our coal product is steadily increasing. The output for the whole colony during last year was 480,831 tons, showing an increase over the previous year of £59,067 tons. The quantity exported for the same period whs 6354 tons, as against 7172 tons for 1883-84 ; while the quantity imported was 148,444 tons, as against 123,540 tons the previous year, showing an increase during 1884-85 of coal imported of 24,904 tons. The total output of the coal mines of the colony, up to 31 at December last, amounts to 3,005,120 tons.