FARMERS AND MANUFACTURERS

Dominion, Volume 27, Issue 58, 1 December 1933, Page 10

FARMERS AND MANUFACTURERS

There is no new truth in the claim made by Mr. J. Abel at the annual meeting of the Wellington Manufacturers’ Association last evening, that manufacturers and farmers are complementary partners in economic progress. But perhaps circumstances illumine the truth a little more brightly now than has sometimes been the case. It is not necessary to agree with all Mr. Abel’s remarks to accept the validity of this central one—not necessary to admit, for example, that our close trading connection with Great Britain amounts to “foolish dependence” on the British market. Trade normally finds its own channels, and the development of our commerce with the Motherland has been mutually helpful. At the moment, however, there is an increasing tendency to obstruct the normal channels of trade. The markets upon which our farmers once prospered are being narrowed against them, and our import trade from the United Kingdom is being slowed down, in consequence. It is this fact which gives new importance to our own secondary industries. If we are not to be allowed to'export as much meat and butter as previously to Great Britain, we have open to us either of two courses. We may restrict our output; or we may seek to extend sales in other markets and to find new markets. It would be. unnatural to restrict output when the whole tendency of our primary industries is to expand. On the other hand, we can have no continuing guarantee that other export markets, too, will not sooner or later block our free entry. It seems easily possible that we might be caught on the horns of a dilemma.

Actually, the outlook is happier. One market will not take up arms against us. Our own internal market. The worker who makes a pair of boots in Northampton may eat Danish or Siberian butter, or none at all. The worker who makes a pair of boots in Wellington cats New Zealand butter. In ,the one market the New Zealand butter producer must always face world competition; in the other he has a monopoly. That, of course, is stating the position crudely, without allowing for any of the delicate adjustments of international trade; and it must not be taken as an absolute argument in favour of New Zealand-made as against British-made goods.- Great Britain will continue for very many years to take millions of pounds worth annually of our food products; and in return, once our debt servicing is provided for, we shall continue to import British goods to roughly an equal value. But as the value of our exports is restricted, so must be the value of pur imports. The logical development, then, will be to trade more with ourselves, so gradually strengthening both our primary and our secondary industries, and, to a limited extent, guarding our national economy against upset from international causes.