628 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. LI. No. 1330 



ing ports of the oountry has shown in a series 

 of articles that trawler owners are losing 

 money owing to the low prices realized for the 

 catches of their boats. 



The difficulties of the industry appear to be 

 due to the greatly increased cost of labor, coal, 

 gear and repairs, to the very large quantities 

 of fish recently landed, and to the lack of fa- 

 cilities for transporting fish from the ports to 

 the inland markets. Working costs can not 

 easily be reduced under existing conditions, 

 and the only remedy for the situation would 

 seem to lie in better distribution and an in- 

 crease in the consumption of fish. The help of 

 the govemiment is sought to improve the means 

 of distribution, but the trawler owners com- 

 plain that the government takes no interest in 

 deep-sea fishing as an industry. 



The view taken by the National Sea Fish- 

 eries Association is that more would be done 

 for the fisheries if the ministry of agriculture 

 and fisheries were organized in two divisions, 

 each with its own secretariat and each with its 

 own vote. The association suggests that a 

 fisheries division of the ministry should be de- 

 veloped, with three branches, dealing re9i)ec- 

 tively, with administrative, executive and 

 research affairs, and that the functions to be 

 distributed among these branches should in- 

 plude the administration of the fisheries vote, 

 the promotion of fisheries legislation, matters 

 relating to international fishery conventions 

 or agreements, executive work bearing on the 

 catching, preparation, marketing, and distri- 

 bution of fish, and researches into the natural 

 history of fish and their treatment as food after 

 capture. 



, A further proposal is that England and 

 Wales should be divided into seven fishery 

 areas, and that each area should be in charge 

 of a commissioner of fisheries with a staff of 

 inspectors and fishery officers sufficient to en- 

 able him to deal with all problems of catching 

 and the distribution of fish in his jurisdiction. 

 Each commissioner would act as the connect- 

 ing link between the government and the in- 

 dustry, between capital and labor within the 

 industry, and ibetween the producer and the 

 distributor. The staff, it is proposed, should 



give assistance in matters affecting the safe 

 dispatch, transport, and delivery of fish from 

 port to market at reasonable rates, in improv- 

 ing conditions at existing markets and inaugu- 

 rating new markets, in the daily tel^raphic 

 publication of wholesale prices at port and 

 market, and in the improvement of fast lateral 

 railway traffic for the carriage of fish from the 

 coasts to the main centers of population. 



THE SIXTH NATIONAL EXPOSITION OF CHEM- 

 ICAL INDUSTRIES 



The National Exposition of Chemical In- 

 dustries returns to the Grand Central Palace 

 in New York, where it will be given during 

 the week of September 20 to 25, 1920, inclu- 

 sive. The Journal of Industrial Chemistry 

 states that this year's esposition wiU be the 

 largest distinctly industrial exposition ever 

 held. In 1915 the first exposition was com.- 

 posed of 83 exhibitors, the second increased to 

 188, the third to 288, the fourth to 334, and the 

 fifth, in which the available space was much, re- 

 stricted and exhibitors were held to a mini- 

 mum, admitted 351 exhibitors. The present 

 number of 358 can not be much increased be- 

 cause of the limited amount of space remain- 

 ping. Another floor has been added, giving four 

 .floors of the Grand Central Palace, each of 

 which covers a city block. To the first exposi- 

 tion there came 63,000 visitors, to the second 

 ,80,000, and this has steadily increased till at 

 the last the attendance exceeded 111,000. 



This year there will be three special sections : 

 the Electric Eurnace, the Euel Economy and 

 the Materials Handling Section. The two 

 Jatter are new sections. The first wiU, as its 

 name implies, be one of electric furnace ex- 

 hibits-; the Fuel Economy Section will consist 

 of exhibits of machinery and apparatus, fur- 

 naces, producers, stokers and all devices for 

 the economic utilization or more efficient com- 

 bustion of fuel. The possible exhaustion of 

 our fuel reserves in the not far distant future 

 ,and the present high cost of fuel make this sec- 

 tion one of nauch interest to all industrial 

 plants. The Materials Handling Section will 

 be a series of exhibits of machinery and equip- 

 ment for the handling of material, such as 



