The Rise in Wool.

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XIX, Issue 1898, 18 October 1886, Page 3

The Rise in Wool.

(Auckland Star),

A good many estimates have been made of the amount of money received by the oniony through the rise in the value of wool. Prices vary so much that it is difficult to get an absolute standard as a starting point In a recent issue we gave soma figures from a Sydney journal throwing a good deal of light on this subject, and the •• Otago Daily Tunes,” in addition to these and other data, has published some vary valuable information. It says the actual prices for the last seven years for a station clip of greasy wool were as follows

1879 .. 91d 1880 .. 15Jdand lljd 1881 .. 11l‘, lOfd, and Bjd 1882 .. Hid, lid, and 10id 1883 .. Hid, 10* d 1884 .. IOJd and 8d 1885 .. 9|d, B£d, and BJd 1886 .. 9Jd and 9d

Comparing these and other retting with the cable new* we have received from day to day relative to the advance of the current wool (ole* in London, the Writer estimates that “ prices on September 16 ‘were a little better than in 1882, bat only a very little, while they ore certainly better than in 1884 and 1885 bv some 10 per cent. The increase in the wealth of the colony is easily estimated—the export of wool for the season of 1686 being 90,760,2531b5, an increase of three halfpence per lb, means an increased clear profit to the colony of £504,750. The country will be that much better off if prices are only maintained. The estimate of the wool export last year was £3,002,731, of which Otago and Southland ooatribnted to the value of £795,973, besides asing at the Mosgisl, (Kaikonra, Boelyn, and Camara Woollen Mills to the value of £43,365waking a total of £839,338 as a total valae of Che wool production in Otago and Southland.

Notwithstanding the enormous export of froaen mutton, the flocks of the colony are steadily on the inereaae. Settlers find that no source of income is so reliable, or involves less trouble than,sheep farming, so long as there is a moderately good market for meat and wool; and as their lands become adapted for the tearing of the useful animal which contributes so largely to the food and clothing of mankind, they permit their flocks to multiply. The number of sheep increases as cultivation and settlement extend. In 1884 the total number of sheep in the colony was 13,978,520 ; in 1885, 14,548,801; in 1886, 15,221,000. The foil capacity of the lands of the country is not nearly reached, and the three millions sterling which the colony now reaps from its wool export alone may yet be doubled before its capabilities for the profit\ble development of this industry have been fa]/* (aken advantage of.