ENGLISH EXPORTS

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 70, 15 December 1939, Page 11

ENGLISH EXPORTS

Maintenance Of Trade Desired

GOVERNMENT’S POLICY

It was essential in the national interest that exporters should be encouraged to maintain and increase their export trade to the greatest extent consistent with vital war needs, and the Government was anxious to assist exporters in every possible way, said the President of the Board of Trade, London, Mr. Oliver Stanley, in a statement on the policy of the United Kingdom Government about the maintenance of United Kingdom export trade.

Some Government direction of the flow of materials for manufacture had inevitably become necessary, but that did not mean that supplies would not be available for the export trade.

No general system of permits or priorities in the allocation of materials was in force, and for the great bulk of manufactured goods which formed the normal export trade of the United Kingdom supplies of the required material could, so far as could be foreseen, safely be relied on for a period of the next three months at least, said Mr. Stanley. Many materials were not subject to Government control at all, and manufacturers should experience no special difficulties in obtaining supplies of those materials. As regards controlled materials, there should in most cases be no difficulty in obtaining the supplies neressary for manufacture for export, and it should only be in exceptional cases that there was insufficient for export needs. The Board of Trade was opening discussions with representatives of major exporting industries with a view to facilitating their operations and in particular their purchases of raw materials. Meanwhile the Minister of Supply had issued instructions to controllers and their staffs to make every effort to allocate supplies where it appeared to them that the controlled materials were for the manufacture of goods for export, specially where those exports were to be in the form of highly-finished goods in which the cost of the raw materials formed a comparatively small part of the value of the .goods. Exporters who had any difficulty in obtaining their requirements should communicate with the Board of Trade, giving full particulars, including the nature of the goods to be exported, the market for which they were destined and the terms of payment. Existing and future contracts for capital goods which take a considerable period to fulfil would receive special consideration with tf view to arrangements being made for the supply of materials and issue of export licences, if and when required. Some manufactured goods could not be exported without a licence, though there were many classes of goods not subject to that control. As regards goods subject to export licence, the issue of licences had been greatly accelerated. To meet the requirements of exporters, the issue of general licences had been increased, and those would be granted wherever practicable. In certain cases applications had been received for licences t.o export to neutral countries adjacent to Germany quantities of raw materials and semi-manufactured goods greatly in excess of the normal flow of trade and it might, of course, be necessary to limit such exports pending the signature of satisfactory war trade agreements toy the countries in question.