THE SUGAR QUESTION.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 10012, 16 April 1898, Page 6

THE SUGAR QUESTION.

TiiEBE are few better examples of the intricate and complicated nature of international commerce, and of the conflicting interests of a wide empire, than is afforded by the sugar question. Germany and France have long stimulated the export of sugar by bounties. In France alone these bounties are said to have reached £4,500,000 last year. The bounties are regarded by economists as practically gifts to the British, who are the chief buyers of bounty sugar. They buy at l£d. per pound, because the Continental Governments have generously paid the rest. This gives the English a great advantage in the jam trade and other industries requiring sugar. The Continental consumer has to pay an excise duty of about Id per pound, and as he lives behind a wall of protection the producer has a monopoly, and nob only charges full cost but makes his profit. Hence the German sometimes pay 3 as much as 5d per pound, or three times as much as the Englishman. Naturally the English, especially the jam makers, are delighted with the bounty system. They not only sell their jam to the Continent, but they enjoy the luxury of sugar themselves to just three times the amount per head that the German does. Yet they are not extravagant, for their three pounds cost about the same as the German's one pound. Naturally enough the German, after fasting and praying for twenty years for the good of Fatherland, begins to doubt whether, in this particular, he is making any headway. Hβ begins to suspect thai the English are laughing in their sleeves at him. "Here I "have been paying full cost, protec- " tion- price and a Id excise, to allow "the Englishman who has no pro- " teefcion or excise duty to buy sugar

"at less than it costs 1 And he " uses three pounds where I use one t "No wonder! Now if we could get " sugar at its natural cost, we should " use double the amount, and should " not need to export at all." Thie feeling is pretty widely spread both in Germany and France, and is stimulated by the threat of the United States to impose countervailing dufcieg, Capitalists, too, feel that the Continental sugar industry depends to too great an extent on the caprice of legislation at homa and abroad, and that it would be on a much more secure basis if left to shift for itself. In Germany there is such confidence in their own superiority in skill that many do not fear competition, and would dispense with the artificial conditions behind which the industry hag been developed. But whether all these forces co-operating will be strong enough to modify the national policy of the past generation remains to be seen.

Meanwhile Britain haa been made to feel the conflicting interests of her wide Empire. While she enjoyed cheap sugar at home, the West Indies were being extinguished by German competition. No one would buy cane sugar at its natural price, while Germany was bribing him to buy beet sugar at less than its natural price. Hence the West Indian Islands, that are among the oldest and most interesting of the British colonies, have steadily sunk into ruin and bank* ruptcy. For tweuty years their bitter cry has been heard and unheeded. They asked Britain to adopt a form of protection and to force beet sugar into a fair field. But free trade could not be sacrificed for all the Indies. They were recommended to seek out new industries, to be more industrious and more economical. The advice was good, but the steady descent to Avernus was not stopped thereby. Recently, however, the United States have begun to take an interest in the matter, and at the mention of countervailing duties the eyes of the West Indies turned appealingly to their big neighbour. Upon this hint John Bull be. stirred himself. He could "not abide, protection. Differential duties wen unfriendly. Bonnties he leaves other people to give. Still there is a feeling that something ought to be done. Sir Ghablbs Wai,. pole, in a recent letter on the subject, declares that if the sugar industry iaf allowed to collapse there will be not only bankruptcy, but bloodshed. Iα Barbadoes, Antigua, St. Kitts, and British Guiana, he says there aria 320,000 people, mostly black, all dependent on sugar for a living, and the negro will not sit down and starve. Before that he will go for the bakers' shops, and this means trouble. Altogether the question is a very difficult one for the British Government to settle. The latest proposal to give cash aid to th« islands from the Imperial Treasury wiU probably be objeoted to by the British taxpayer, and in any oase is hardly likely to prove more than a palliative.