MOTIVES OF IMPORT CONTROL

Ellesmere Guardian, Volume LX, Issue 15, 24 February 1939, Page 4

MOTIVES OF IMPORT CONTROL

It is not suggested that all countries are actuated solely by the desire to meet their overseas creditors when they restrict imports, says the London Times Trade and Engineering Supplement in discussing the New Zealand import control scheme. They may indeed have fallen under the lure of self-containment. Why should we be dependent on outside sources for goods that we could make ourselves? they ask. The answer is that there is no reason whatever provided that they are prepared to 1 pay the price which will have to be paid by their own people. It is obvious that if spades are excluded in the interests of the industry of. spade making and the cost of producing them in the country is greater than the price at which they can be imported, spade users will be penalised and their standard thereby reduced. If this discrepancy in cost is merely temporary it may be worth while, but that does 'not alter the fact that the "baby" industry is established at the cost of the community. The same applies to all other articles so that logically it comes to this, thai a young country should consider fisca' policy in the light of expediency. It

should first ask itself whether it is prudent to attempt a comprehensive policy of self-containment or whether it would be wiser to protect only such industries as are necessary to the

State to hold out a prospect of being able to stand alone in fair competition at an early date. We said last month that in considering exports it was relevant to bear in mind the imports received in return. It is equally necessary to bear in mind that restriction of imports may make it difficult to secure payment for exports. The fundamental principle is that commerce 'SlusT bring benefit to both parties or it will inevitably dwindle away. As much is to be feared from those who seek unfair advantage for themselevs as from those who deliberately determine to damage their neighbours' commerce. Neither policy is justified, nor, indeed, intelligent. The rehabilitation of the world is dependent not on the restriction of commerce, but on its ex--

pansion