TIMBER TRADE.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 19888, 27 March 1930, Page 4

TIMBER TRADE.

UNFAIR COMPETITION. The chairman of the Sawmillers' Timber Trading Mr J. A. Bash, in an interview said: "The trouble in the trade is the unfair competition of American timber. When 1 say unfair, I mean that this foreign timber is brought to the Dominion in vessels which are subsidised by the United States Government, ostensibly for carrying mails. "The whole thing has become nothing short of a farce, as is shown; by the fact that one boat recently brought two bags of mail, for which the subr sidy worked out at £1433 a bag. The main cargo was timber, of which there were 2,000,000 ft on board, carried at a ridiculously low freight." Mr Bush went on to say that,the continued: importation of this timber not only ;|was' making a bad exchange position worse, but was accentuating the unemployed problem in the country to a marked extent. Admittedly the Government had done something. When the Hon. J. G. Coates was in power he set up a committee, consisting of representatives of the Public Works Department, Forestry Department, and the sawmillers, and a now system of grading timber was so that it would be possible to compete with subsidised American timberV Then when Sir Joseph Ward assumed' office he had given instructions that in all Government buildings only New Zealand timber was to be used. These steps certainly assisted, but now in connexion with the erection of workers' houses a departmental "hold-up" had occurred, as a result of which a premium was being placed on American timber-