Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1899 American Edition.djvu/1306

 950

RUSSIA

from tlie following districts, with the amount obtained 1893 : Altai and Nertchinsk, 13,680 lbs. ; Semipalatinsk, 3,564 lbs. ; Caucasus, 1,188 lbs. ; from gold, 7, 956 lbs. Platinum in the Urals. Copper was obtained chiefly in the Urals (2,589 tons in 1895) and the Caucasus (2, 100 tons). Cobalt is found in the Elisabethpol government of Caucasia (56 cwt. of ore in 1895) ; also manganese ore (118,170 tons of ore). Mercury was extracted in S. Russia to the amount of 954,000 lbs. in 1895, (81 tons of ore in Caucasia) ; tin, 12 tons in Finland. Zinc comes entirely from Poland. Of the salt extracted in 1895, 797,700 tons were from South Russia ; 270,000 from Astrakhan ; 277,000 from Penn ; 40,000 from Caucasia; 39,000 from Orenburg; the remainder being from Turkestan, the Transcaspian region, Siberia, North Russia, and Poland. In 1895 21,895 workers were employed in the salt works.

The province of Ekaterinoslav grows to be an important centre of iron mining. In 1895 South Russia yielded 533,000 tons of pig iron, 24,200 of iron, 35,000 tons of steel, and 194,000 tons of rails. The manufacture of agri- cultural machinery, which was valued at 2^ million roubles in 1867, rose to nearly 10 million roubles in 1885, and has much increased since.

Iron is chiefly obtained from the Urals (542.000 tons of pig-iron in 1895), South Russia (same quantit}^, and Poland (181,000 tons), the remainder of the Empire, exclusive of Finland, supplying only 165,000 tons. The import duties are so high that they are nearly 150 per cent, of the price of pig-iron in England, i.e., 28r. 12c. (about 56.s'., per ton). The imports of pig iron were only 75,000 tons in 1896 (160,000 in 1893), and of iron and steel goods 837,000 tons (357, 000 in 1893), the annual consumption per head being thus 38 lbs. of iron per inhabitant.

In 1896 the output of coal in the most important coalfields was : — Perm, 330,630 tons; Moscow, 154,178 tons; Western District, 3,510,480 tons; Kharkov- Poltava, 574,020 tons ; Lugansk, 1,110,000 tons : Bakhmut, 1,219,650 tons. Strong measures have been taken to increase the local con- sumption of Russian coal and coke by im])osing a duty of 98if?. per ton of coal imported through the Black Sea, 47^?. through the Western frontier, and 23ic?. through the Baltic Sea, and by reducing the tariff's of railway shipping of Russian coal from the Don mines. The import of foreign coal and coke has not been reduced.

Imports of

Coal Tons

Coke Tons

Imports of

Coal Tons

Coke Tons

1891 1892 1893

1,502,800 1,410,900 1,682,000

199,900 226,500 285,300

1894

1895

■ 1896

1,736,000 1,942,400 1,948,600

276,000 236,240 357,800 1

During the last three j'cars the annual consumption of iuel in the Moscow manufacturing region was about 1,000,000 tons of wood, 80,000 tons of English coal, 80,000 tons of Russinn coal, and about 80,000 tons of naphtha refuse. The Caspian na])htha industry is extending very rajntlly. The output of petroleum in various forms in 1896 was (in gallons) : crude oil, 127,423,000 ; residuum, 927,125,000 ; illuminating oil, 433,615,000 ; lubricat- ing oil, 42,785,000 ; others, 5,180,000 ; total, 1,536,130,000.

The number of persons engaged in the mining and working of minerals was 498,351 in 1895 : of these, 232,285 were in the Ural, 42,625 in central] Russia, 36,449 in Poland and the North- West, 83,784 in the South andj South-West, 21,518 in the Caucasus, and 55,517 in Siberia. The number o\