TRADE PACTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 109, 11 May 1933, Page 7

TRADE PACTS.

AGAINST OTTAWA?

BRITISH AGREEMENTS.

Treaties With Argentina and Denmark Discussed. POSITION OF NEW ZEALAND. (United P.A.—Electric Telegraph—Copyright) (Received 12.30 p.m.) LONDON, May 10. Mr. L. C. Amery (Con., Sparkbrook) said in the House of Commons that both the Danish and Argentine trade agreements with Britain contradicted the whole spirit of the Ottawa agreements. They barred in many directions any expansion of Imperial preference. "We are on the verge of solving the problem of sending the Dominions' chilled beef to Britain, Rhodesia is making hopeful experiments in that direction. There is reason to believe that Australian chilled beef could be brought in good condition, yet the Argentine agreement will prevent the development of this trade.

"Denmark got the minimum quota of our total butter imports compared with the serious diminution of Dominion supplies. Valuable as the Danish trade was, it must be remembered that New Zealand butter represented £3,000,000 in freights alone, and that the New Zealand shipping trade represented an actual value of £25,000,000. Heavy Capital Investment. Mr. Walter Runciman, President of the Board of Trade, said the Danish and Argentine trade agreements were with countries which had been in close commercial alliance with Britain for a very long time. In Argentina nearly all the great developments of docks, harbours, railways and roads had been effected out of facilities provided by Britain. The total amount invested in providing the Argentine railways was estimated at over £500,000,000. There was no investment with outside countries comparable with this within the experience of modern industry.

In the case of Denmark, a large amount of industrial prosperity had depended not so much on British enterprise as upon Danish .enterprise in British markets. The balance of trade had, for the last twenty years, been preponderantly on the side of Denmark In 1930 the imports flronn Denmark exceeded exports to Denmark five times. Following the exhibition of British goods at Copenhagen tine ratio was reduced in 1932 to 4 to 1, but that did not go far enough. As an outstanding feature of the increased trade as the result of the agreement, he cited the order for the Storsfarorn Bridge and mentioned the general understanding that for Government and municipal purposes the first offer of orders for iron and -steel should be made to United Kingdom firms coupled, in the case of the Government, with a price preference of 10 per cent on either side. Britain had given an undertaking regarding Danish bacon and ham. The agreement achieved something in the way of security for the future. Liquefying Frozen Money, An entirely different set of problems presented themselves in regard to the Argentine, where, unlike Denmark, tariffs were high and had. been made to secure a reduction in . duties. Under the financial section of the agreement there have been sent here about f1,250,000 to liquefy small transactions. Beyond that total the amount still due would be liquefied through the process of bonds issued on the security of the Argentine Government, to be placed in the hands of representative authorities here and used, by tliem for the provision of cash in sterling in place of frozen paper. This meant liquefying about £11,000,000, and, having once started this process of liquefying cash which _ had been frozen under exchange restrictions, they hoped the example would be followed elsewhere. Everything would be_ done on Britain's part to facilitate similar transactions.

The representatives of the Argentine had undertaken, as goods of which a substantial proportion of the imports into Argentine was derived from the United Kingdom and in, respect of which proposals had been to them tor reduction of Customs duties, to revert in general to the rates of duty and the valuation of duty of such goods in force in 1930. Discussions were to be continued in the Argentine. He pointed out as a remarkable fact that no less than 99 per cent of the chilled beef exported from the Argentine came to Britain. They had to bear in mind in dealing with Argentine wheat that two other markets, the' Home and Dominion markets, were of primary concern to Britain. The Government hoped by these agreements that it had done something to turn the tide and that the pacts would now tend in the direction of a steadier price level. There was no division on the trade agreements, which were discussed under an adjournment motion. This was withdrawn.