Abstract
THE Imperial Economic Conference has approved a scheme whereby the Imperial Institute is to be reconstituted; a representative of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research is to be one of a committee of three appointed to see that the Institute laboratories limit their work to preliminary inquiries, and the Galleries are to be closed, in spite of the protest of New Zealand, on the score of economy. The detailed account which has just been issued by the Imperial Institute (Bulletin of the Imperial Institute, vol. xxi., No. i, pp. iv + zSg, price 3.?. 6d.) of its work in recent years has been published at a very convenient time. The Institute was founded in 1887, but until 1903 the work for which it was established was subordinated to the effort to run it as a social club attached to a ballet. It was reorganised in 1903, and in that year it began the publication of its quarterly Bulletin, which now has a circulation of 3000 copies, and also issued the first report by its Mineral Surveys. Its efforts then to undertake the work for which it was founded were handicapped by restrictions, burdens, and prejudices inherited from the former regime. The Institute has, however, been steadily surmounting these difficulties and building up an organisation by which to help the utilisation of the varied materials still lying unused in the Empire Overseas. It works by three main branches. Its Department of Scientific and Technical Research investigates all kinds of raw materials and advises as to their profitable employment. Its Intelligence Department gives information and advice, and is aided by committees of tommercial, technical, and scientific experts, which deal with raw materials, silk production, rubber research, timber, and the mineral resources of the Empire. The extensive museum attractively displays the chief raw materials and illustrates the geographical conditions under which they are produced and the processes by which they are utilised.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
The Imperial Institute and the Development of Overseas Resources. Nature 112, 677–678 (1923). https://doi.org/10.1038/112677a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/112677a0