

CHAPTER VI. 



PRODUCTION IN BURMA AND ITS RELATION TO THE WORLD'S 



OUTPUT. 



The modern demand for wolfram arose about 1903, as a conse- 

 quence of the development of high speed tool steel manufacture ; 

 before that year the mineral was regarded as an impurity by tin 

 smelters in England, but after 1903 the price quickly responded 

 to the growing requirements and the output of tungsten minerals 

 from various countries in the world began to increase. In 1910, 

 when mining commenced in Tavoy, the world's production was 

 about 6,000 tons of 60 per cent. \Y0 3 concentrates and the partici- 

 pating countries were the United States, Portugal and Queensland, 

 with smaller amounts from the Argentine, Bolivia and New South 

 Wales. By the year 1911, wolfram mining was thoroughly estab- 

 lished in Tavoy, and an output of over 1,300 tons made Burma 

 the leading tungsten-producing country in the world, a position 

 she maintained until 1916, when the boom in the Americas caused 

 the production of the United. States and of Bolivia to exceed hers. 

 Tables are given showing the output of wolfram and cassiteiite 

 from Tavoy and from Burma from 1910 to 1918. 



In 1914, out of a world's production of some 8,000 tons, Burma 

 alone produced 2,300. By this time other countries had entered 

 the list — Japan, Siam, the Malay States and Billiton in Asia, the 

 Northern Territory of Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand and Peiu, 

 while the European countries, including Germany and Aust ia, 

 contributed their small quotas. Although Germany had no 

 important domestic supplies and possessed none in any of her 

 foreign territories, in 1913 she has been credited with the control 

 of two-thirds of the world's output. 1 Thus she treated nearly 

 6,000 tons of 60 per cent, concentrates. The British steel makers 

 generally obtained their supplies of finished tungsten products 

 from the German manufacturers and it is no secret that August 

 1914 found Britain with but a few months stock in hand. In 1915 

 steps were taken by the Imperial Government to increase the output 



1 F. H. Hess. '' Political and Commercial Geology Series No, 1. The Tungsten 

 Resources of the Wcu-ld," Eng. and Min. Jour., November 1st, 1919. 



G 



