New Caledonia's Mines
p. 40 · Read in the full issue
From Our Own Correspondent NOUMEA, March 9.
THE number of workers employed in the mining industry in New Cale donia, varied between 6,000 and 6,400 in 1941, of whom 300 were heads and foremen —an average of one foreman to every 21 labourers.
The nickel smelters employed 19 per cent., and the nickel mines 54 per cent, of the total; thus the nickel industry was responsible for 73 per cent, of the mining effective. Chrome mines came next with 16 per cent., then iron with 9 per cent.
All but 10 per cent, of the work was above ground, for the major part of Caledonian mines use open cut quarrying methods, and only in certain of the largest mines, like the American Fan toche chrome mine, do works go far
underground.