PAPER FAMINE.

Wanganui Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 160711, 26 July 1920, Page 7

PAPER FAMINE.

SCANDINAVIAN CONTiiOL SOARING PRICES. LONDON, May 20. Over 300 newspapers have increased their price during the present year. “Ihe Newspaper vVorld” discusses the prospect of famine prices of paper, and as a timely warning as to what is in store for paper users in this and other countries, points out that British papermakers may soon be compelled once more to turn their attention to wastepaper as a raw material to a far greater extent than they do now. An analysis of the Board of Trade returns for the past four months shows that the average price for mechanical pulp has risen in the course of six years from about £4 10s per ton u. about £24 per ton, and for high-grade pure sulphites from £lO a ton to between £SO and £6O per ton. Seeing that the cost of all other raw materials and chemicals is double or treble w hat it was, and workers’ wages are, reckoned according to the time w'orked, more than double, it is little wonder that pure white printings at 2d per lb are things of the past, and likely to be, so long as this generation lasts. The action of the Norwegian Government with regard to paper may have an effect upon the quantity of pulp coming across to this country. Some think that it will reduce the tonnage of paper being made in that country, so that the pulp mills will have more for export, and will be willing to sell at a reduced price, but others consider that, as the pulp mills and paper mills so often belong to the same companies, they will want to make up on the pulp for anything they may lose on the paper from home consumption, and so will keep up the price as at present, or even force it higher. The bulk of the country’s imports come from the Scandinavian countries and Canada, and consists in what is known technically as mechanical wet pulp, most coming from Norway. “The limes” mentions that in a single recent week we bought 7866 tons of this wet pulp from Norway—price £121,759 ; from Canada we had in the same period only 490 tons—price £BB2O. Finland was the largest contributor of mechanical dry pulp, sending 985 tons—price £34,657. Nearly 4000 tons of dry unbleached chemical pulp, value slightly over £170,000, came from Canada. Norway is the largest contributor in bulk, and is particularly rich in pine and spruce, but unfortunately when wood was cheap and labour was not as costly as now, the millowners who were offered the opportunity did not buy up timber tracts for their own use from the farmers. The result is that today, when the Remand is higher than it has ever been, the farmer can demand and get his own price, since the raw material remains in his hands to be disposed of in the most productive market. He controls the cutting of the wood, and hence the supply of it. These facts help to explain the ever-increas-ing price of imported wood-pulp, which stands to-day at £ls per ton for mechanical pulp, as compared with £5 10s six montlis ago, and thus illustrates further the evil, so far as the British importer is concerned, of depending exclusively, or almost exclusively, upon supplies imported from foreign countries when there exists within the Empire a vast unexploited source of supply that could not be exhausted in many generations. TOO COSTLY PULPING. Meanwhile the profits made by the exporters are vast and growing, and the position of the importer becomes steadily more difficult, and the situation in the paper trade at Home more and more acute. It has been suggested that timber should be imported and pulped in Great Britain, but “The Times” says there is not a pulp or paper merchant in the country who would support this proposition. No colony growing pine or spruce would consider the export of such timber in the raw for pulping, and even if tho timber were brought to this country, the problem of pulping it here presents insuperable difficulties. To make the process pay a mill is required containing at least fifty grindstones, each malting five tons a day. Such plant requires 25,000 horse power to work it. Water power on such productive lines does not exist in this country. A recent examination of tho Thames showed that at full water it produced 2000 horse-power. The alternative is to use steam, which the price of coal makes impossible. Moreover, a cord of wood, the unit of cut timber for pulping which measures 128 cubic feet, weighs 2.33 tons, aud produces 20001b of dry pulp. Freight rates, therefore, would represent a huge sum in a bill of costs for pulping on a big scale in Great Britain, already immensely expanded bv the cost of fuel and labour. These are the considerations that the trade is advancing in support of it a contention that the only solution of the paper problem is 1, that tho control should be removed from the Scandinavian exporter by creating new sources of supply in the untapped forests of Canada. TAPER FROM THE BAOBAB. Any new prospective source of tho raw materials for paper is of value just now, and the suggestion is made bv n' “Times’ ” correspondent that tho baobab might provide a suitable pulp. This giant tree, whose stem may reach thirty feet in diameter, is famliiar in the more open parts of the African bush. From its massive resistance to extirpation it frequently survives in the clearings of settlers. Seen from a distance, its crown of dark foliage and noble stem recall the trees of England’s parks. But, on a closer view, there is something fungoid and monstrous in the bloated trunk and the abrupt tapering of the branches.. At present the baobab is practically useless, though the natives are able to make rope, or even to weave cloth, from the fibres of the bark. The wood is soft, and useless as timber or as fuel. Decay and easy excavation provide harbourage in the trunk for leopards and civets, owls and Hornbills, lemurs and treedassies, painted lizards, and a multitude of creeping things find security in the foliage. But the planter would be willing to sell the trees cheaply if the pulp maker can take delivery on the spot. Even if the baobab supplies a percentage of pulp higher than the yield from esparto, its unwieldy bulk and scattered habit of growth make transport difficult. The trees that now form the source of the wood pulp grow in thick forests, into which the cutters can cut continuously. Sir H. H. Johnston proposes that attention be turned to the huge bel«« of elephant grass and tall reeds which fringe the lakes and rivers of tropical Africa. The quantity is unlimited, and "the plants are of a kind which can be cut and tied into units convenient for the adjacent water transport. Experts, however, will have to decide as to the cost of extracting and softening the pulp.

Major Shorny. director of the- Meige Pulpwood Uoiiipiiuv <i Canada, predicts, that the of pulpwood will di!i i:i a few months. He explains ihat most of the pulpwood companies are increasing their production considerably, that last year was one of the leanest for production, and this one the greatest. His company had practically doubled its former production. Tho idea of the pulpwood industry making more money by holding bate’e production, and thus “boosting” the price has, Major Shorey says ? no place in the minds of the captains of industry.