BRITISH-DOMINION TRADE.

Auckland Star, Volume 55, Issue 2, 3 January 1924, Page 4

BRITISH-DOMINION TRADE.

In his annual report, which is summarised in our news to-day, the British 'Trade Commissioner in Australia says 'one or two things that will please Ausitralia and other* things that will not please some of them. He finds that Australia's manufacturing industries, though protected by a high tariff, which in some cases is almost prohibitive, are making comparatively slow progress, the reasons being the almost stationary and relatively small home market and high costs of production and distribution. Australians who picture Australia as a great manufacturing country will not like this, yet it is doubtful whether their influence will induce the Federal Parliament to give Australia still higher protection. The Commissioner seems to be fairly well satisfied with British trade in Australia. The proportion, he says, continues to improve; the Commonwealth is Britain's second best overseas market, and in a few years it may be the best. The Commonwealth Year Book shows that from the end of the war to 1921-22 Britain's proportion of imports into Australia rose from 33.8 to 51.43 per cent., but that higher percentage was considerably lower than the percentage before the war. The Commissioner, however, warns British traders, in terms similar to those used by the New Zealand Commissioner in his recent annual report, that they must take more care of their market if they are to keep and develop it. They must study Australian conditions and treat agents more generously. The complaint about manufacturers not studying colonial conditions is an old one, and most of our readers are familiar with examples of the advantages that foreign competitors have gained by being more attentive to the needs of Dominion customers. One benefit- to be derived from the appointment of these Commissioners is the reiteration of this warning from officials who are in a position to know and to command a hearing. It is to be hoped that now that the unsatisfactory state of Europe is making British manufacturers, more eager to sell goods in the Dominions, they will pay more heed to these appeals for a closer study of market conditions.