CLOTH FAMINE.

Western Star, 19 March 1920, Page 4

CLOTH FAMINE.

Europe is in great need of woollen and cotton goods, and manufacturers cannot satisfy it quickly enough. Since last April buyers from almost every Allied and neutral European country have been in England buying up whatever textile fabrics and 'clothing they could secure for quick delivery. To them price has been a secondary consideration, and owing to the colossal demand the woollen manufacturers have for months past been so inundated with orders that even if their production, had. been double or treble what it is they could with ease dispose of it all. There are ample supplies of raw wool in England, far more than the machinery can handle, but plentiful raw material does not necessarily mean cheap clothing, which depends mainly to-day on production. Most of the woollen and worsted manufacturers have sufficient orders on their books to keep their machinery employed throughout the whole of 1920, and'numbers of them cannot accept any further business for delivery before March to June 1921. Prices- have been advancing for months, and within the past week or two various manufacturers have intimated further increases of as much as 2s 6d a yard. For the raw wool they are having to pay for the merino descriptions (which are the best) more than double the issue prices fixed by the British Government early last year. ;