“No Arrangements Yet To Soften E.E.C.’s Effect”

Press, Volume C, Issue 29684, 30 November 1961, Page 16

“No Arrangements Yet To Soften E.E.C.’s Effect”

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, November 29. “There is still no known generally acceptable way by which the United Kingdom can enter the European Economic Community without grievous harm to New Zealand,” says the “New Zealand Meat Producer,” the journal of the sheepfarming industry, in an editorial. “No special arrangements to meet New Zealand’s position appear yet to be in sight, and the greatest danger of all could be in any acceptance by the New Zealand Government of quotas.”

“United Kingdom Government spokesmen continue to state that they will protect the interests of the Commonwealth, but spokesmen of the European Six emphatically declare that the principle of the Customs union, which is the basis of the EE.C. cannot be allowed to be breached,” the editorial says. “In recent discussions in Europe signs of grave strain within the Commonwealth developed—particularly between Canada and the United Kingdom. “New Zealand, however, remains the country standing in greatest danger, and by far the greatest threat is that of the imposition of quotas on our exports. It is difficult to see how quotas in any form could be accepted by any negotiator on behalf of New Zealand. ’“For the sheep industry, a quota on lamb would put our trade into a strait-jacket. “No-one with knowledge of meat marketing could agree that the market in the United Kingdom for our lamb has, by any means, reached its limit That is the idea which some United Kingdom spokesmen would like to persuade

us to accept, because, if we did, it would be an easy step to persuade us next to accept limitation, thus abandoning the principle of unrestricted duty-free access, on which our trade has been built. French Suggestion “It was lately stated that the French at the G.A.T.T. conference in late November would possibly seek to persuade the G.A.T.T. nations to agree to a quota system for primary products and a stockpiling scheme, providing for distribution to underdeveloped nations. “If such a scheme were implemented, it could do much more towards reducing standard of living in producing countries than it could hope to achieve in raising standards in poorer countries. “New Zealand’s concern at E.E.C. plans, and at the general growth of protectionism in the agricultural field, is strongly shared by that other great meat-producing country, the Argentine. “The Argentine and Brazil agreed between themselves to co-operate in seeking to impress on the G.A.T.T. conference their views that

‘European protectionism foils effort* to organise world trade on a multilateral basis.' “These two countries issued a communique stating that’ ‘discrimination adopted by highly - industrialised countries’ made the foreign trade prospects of the Argentine and Brazil unfavourable. “That is surely an understatement The plans of the highly - industrialised countries to discriminate against primary producers still more sharply cannot lead to a strengthening of trade among the Western nations. It can only lead to economic and political instability within primary-producing countries and eventually rebound on the industrial nations themselves.”