TRADE RECOVERY IN GERMANY

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25709, 22 January 1949, Page 7

TRADE RECOVERY IN GERMANY

British Fears Of Competition MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES (Rec. 9 p.m.) LONDON, January 21. “The swift transformation of the Western Powers’ zone of Germany from a war devastated area into a hive of industrial activity, competing for the world’s export markets, has alarmed leading British manufacturers and trade unionists,” says the “Daily Mail.” “After inconclusive talks with the Minister of Supply (Mr G. R. Strauss), they have approached the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Stafford Cripps) to ask the Cabinet to protect British exporters from German competition. They assert that, because of low wages and costs, Germans have captured valuable foreign orders from British firms. They fear that cheaply produced goods with a ‘made in Germany’ trade mark may again flood the markets of the world. “Although many sections of the export trade share this anxiety, the approach to Sir Stafford Cripps was made on behalf of the engineering industry. "Sir Stafford Cripps has arranged for the President of the Board of Trade (Mr J. H. Wilson) to hear a case which will be presented by Sir Greville Maginness, a member of the employers’ panel of the Engineering Advisory Council, and Mr Garvin Martin, secretary of the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions, which has a membership of 3,000,000. Growth of German Output “British industrialists who have visited Bizonia have been staggered by the resurrection of German industry since the currency reform in last June. The output is now back to 75 per cent, of its pre-war figure, and exports are at the rate of £200,000,000 worth a year. The Germans have been set an immediate target of doubling this output. "Britain’s scientific instrument makers say that German workers’ wages—the average is about £3 3s a weekj compared with £6 14s in Britain —make it impossible to compete with the Germans. They claim that the future of an export trade which brings Britain £10,000.000 a year, compared with £1,000.000 before the war, is in the balance.

“Motor manufacturers, who are apprehensive about the growing German competition in overseas markets for small cars, have asked for safeguards. Diesel engine manufacturers are also complaining of German price cutting. “The Federation of British Industries has established a committee to report on the question of German exports.”