ARGENTINA'S WEALTH

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 216, 12 September 1944, Page 6

ARGENTINA'S WEALTH

BIGGEST BEEF EXPORT INTERESTING FACTS QUOTED That the Argentine was the world's largest producer and exporter of linseed, beef and maize, and the second largest producer of wheat and wool, was mentioned by Mi. *. R. Baker, general manager of the New Zealand insurance Co., laci., and a resident of the Argentine for 24 years, in a luncheon address to the Auckland Creditmen's Club today. Among other large exports, he said, were dairy produce and tannin. "What is not generaly known is that the Argentine produces also nearly as much value m its textile and other secondary industries, mainly for local consumption, as it does from its whole pastoral and agriculutral activities," said Mr. Baker. Under peace-time conditions the republic also produced more wealth in less than half of its area than all the rest of South America combined, he added. With an almost entirely European population of close on 14,000,000, the Argentine could easily support ten times that number. The entire national debt amounted to less than £350.000,000 sterling, and the country took pride in the fact that _it had never defaulted in any of its debt obligations.