During the transplanting, preferably done on cloudy days or during light rains, the plants must be handled very carefully; machines are now available which can set out and water plants over from two to six acres in a working day.
There are 19 presses and it is possible with these to strike between 700,000 and 800,000 pieces in an ordinary working day.
A pair of working converters has made 4958 charges of 10 tons each, or a total of 50,547 tons, in one month, or at an average rate of a charge every seven minutes and twenty-four seconds throughout every working day.
The Smet de Naeyer ministry which had held office since 1900 was defeated in April 1907 in a debate on the mining law over the proposal concerning the length of the working day.
In 1884 and 1885 important laws were passed regulating the work in mines and factories, and introducing a maximum working day of eleven hours in factories, and ten hours in mines.
