Smelting and refining is confined to the reclamation of scrap metals and, up to the present, iron and brass founding has been the main activity in this group. A plant to smelt and reroll steel scrap into merchant-bar products (such as reinforcing rod and engineering rounds and flats) has been established in the North Island. Other activities include steel founding, lead rolling, extrusion of lead, brass, and aluminium forms, and copper-wire drawing and its insulation. In 1962–63 the output of this group was valued at £5.6 million.
Co-creator
Henry Curran Holden, M.A., Director, Trade Relations and Economics Division, and Economist, Department of Industries and Commerce, Wellington.