COMING INDUSTRIES. No. I. Ironfields of the Dominion. (Blocks from Government Bulletin, No. 3.)

Progress, Volume III, Issue 9, 1 July 1908, Page 300

COMING INDUSTRIES. No. I. Ironfields of the Dominion. (Blocks from Government Bulletin, No. 3.)

There are enormous deposits of iron ore of very excellent quality in the Dominion. Of these, most is known of the deposits at Parapara, in the Karamea district of Nelson, not far from Collingwood. A vigorous attempt has been made to start the iron industry

there, and it has been assisted by substantial encouragement by Government and Parliament. Apparently the attempt has not succeeded : but the deposits are still to the fore, and public opinion is very eager about seeing the industry established. Of course the only question for the practical rr an is, will the indus try pay when i 1 is established ■> Naturally his first question is as to the consumption of the Dominion. In the year 1906 the Dominion used iron, of all kinds — pig and manufactured iron, in all shapes —some 131,000 tons, for which it paid the import value of £1,330,500. That does not irean that the industry, when established, can hope to handle the whole of that million and a third of sterling value. There is, indeed, an opinion to the effect that we should confine ourselves to the production of pig iron. Well, the import of pig iron in the year named was 10,624 tons, of the import value of £43,673. In view of that figure, it be-

comes necessary to consider what other openings there may be in the long list of the importations into the Dominion. Bars, bolts, and angle iron, total up to the respectable figure of nearly £190,000 ; pipes and fittings loom substantially at £153,000 ;

rails, with the necessary accompaniments, come up to no less than £250,000 , sheet and plate, galvanised, plain, and corrugated, reach the high figure of nearly £400,000 Other manufactures there are, but the whole

weight of everything in tons (without the pig iron) comes no higher than some 120,000 tons. There is something for industry to hope for, but it is limited by the total weight, and by the fact that the difficulties in the

way of establishing the iron industry outside of the limits of the production of the raw material of manufacture, namely the pig iron of commerce, are somewhat large. It is clearly a case for the assistance of the State through the bonus system— a fact the State

has practically admitted lor many years past, and is admitting to-dry, with Iho'^an c practical earnestness. At this stage of the discussion, one is iclrpnded of the stateliest of an importer's

agent, that the smallest blast furnace conceivable would turn out all the iron required by the Dominion in a few w oeks, and then fail economically by running down— a thing fatal to th^ economic production of merchantable iron, as every one knows who ha-> ever had anything to do w ith the same Shall w e be discouraged ? No : for here looms up the recent statement of the President of the United States, warning his people that the end of the magnificent resources of their territory is in sight, and that the iron supply.

in particular, is on the borders of extinction, and must be conserved in some scientific drastic \va3r. This gives a new shape to the fact that the world's consumption is great and is increasing: by lear>s and

bounds. In the last century (it has been computed) the world consumed 3,300 million tons of iron : but at the rate of the present consumption, the century now current will require to be supplied with fifteen thousand million tons, and the general cry is where will it come from ? The world's output of pig iron in 1903 was a little over forty-six million tons. To this aggregate, the principal contributing countries wereasiollows • U.S. 18,009,252 Germany 10,085,634 Great Britain . . . 8,811,204 France ... . 2,827,668 Belgium . . . . . . . 1,216,500 Canada 265,418 Russia 2,453,953 These countries contributed a little over 43 i. millions of the total of 46 millions and over. The percentages of the different

supply countries were • United States 3884, Great Britain 192 7, Germany and Luxembourg 2175, France 6-13, Belgium 2-63, Austria-Hungary 3.08, Russia and Finland 5-29, Sweden TO9, Spain 065, Italy 0-16, Canada 0-57, other countries 054. Now, President Roosevelt, in his astonishing message to Congress the other day, stated

that the end of the world's supply at the present rate of use would come in about fifty years. The figures we have quoted of the consumption of the two centuries, the last and the current (estimated, the latter of course) go some way towards bearing trim out. Mr. Carnegie, who knows what he is talking about whenever he has to do with iron, Lias stated that the high class Cleveland ironstone will be practically exlausted in :wenty - f i ye years, and the high grade supplies of iron ore in the United States by the middle of the present century, or about twenty years later. Mr. Hadfield, the English authority, estimates that by the year 2000 the United Kingdom alone will require a supply of 450 million tons of iron ore per annum. The American autherity, Dr. Atkinson (the statistician of Boston) declares " should two-thirds

of the present population of the globe ever consume as much iron per head as the inhabitants of the United Kingdom and America, namely about 560 lbs. per head, the demand would have to be met by a world supply of about 300 million tons per year." This seems to take off a big discount from the British conclusion, but both men unite in asking where the supplies are to come from. We read, moreover, in the Karamea Parapara Bulletin of Mr. Bell, that " The world's supply of high grade iron ores is rapidly decreasing, owing to the enormous annual production of iron necessitated by modern methods of construction," adding that " it has been estimated by very good authorities that, at the present rate of iron consumption, within fifty years the world's visible supply of ores now considered sufficiently high-grade to be employed for manufacture will be exhausted " From all of which it will be readily realised that the American President has ample ground for the sensational statements he made to Congress about the approaching exhaustion of the world's iron ores of merchantable quality. It is, moreovei, well established that the rate of the use of iron by the world is increasing far faster than the world's population It follows, therefore, that any country possessing a valuable asset of iron ore may find it difficult to go wrong in any attempt it may make to turn the same into money, and as soon as it likes to try. This note was in Mr. Bell's mind when he was stating the conclusions of the experts. "In view," said he, " of these considerations, the value of the immense deposits of iron ore at Parapara cannot be doubted, and the day does not seem far. distant when this great store of material wealth will be utilised." In plain English, there is a market, and a growing market, for every ton of ore that can be converted at Parapara. The world's markets are fairly stretching out their hands to the Dominion of New Zealand, eager to take all we can give.