INTERNAL TRADE

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 56, 15 September 1928, Page 10

INTERNAL TRADE

AN OPTIMISTIC NOTE | GOVERNOR-GENERAL'S VIEWS An optimistic note was struck by the Governor-General (Sir Charles J'ergusson) when speaking to commercial travellers last evening on the internal trade of New Zealand. His Excellency said that when they met last year times were not too good, though they were a bit better than in 1920, when the prosperity of the Dominion temporarily was on the down grade. We had an adverse trade balance, our exports had diminished enormously. " The adverse trade balance was due to the fact that the imports exceeded the exports. In September last we were just about at the very pit of the depression. It- was always rather difficult to estimate the actual position of internal trade. External trade could be judged ani* estimated by the Customs returns, but the condition of tho country could only be judged from a study of- a number of factors: Bank deposits, post-office savings bank deposits, land transfers, building permits, and things of that sort. Thank goodness we could to-day look on a very much brighter picture. The first quarter of the year showed a marked difference; the second quarter, a greater difference. The unfavourable trade balance had been converted into a favourable trade balance of something like twelve millions. His Excellency referred to the banking, returns, telegraph returns, bank note issue, buildings, and last but not least the totalisator returns—(laughter). They showed buoyancy and that we had turned the corner, and that there was hope in the immediate future. That affected everybody; the country and the Empire as a whole. Although they met in a. feeling of optimism that was justified, a word of warning was not out of place. Although last year was a year of great price and great production, and although the prospects for the future were good, he gathered from what he read, except probably in. the case of wool, there was no great indication that world prices generally showed any great signs of improvement. The prices for the particular products of New Zealand did show a great deal of improvement, but it was not so general with world prices. Some judges anticipated that prices, with the exception probably of wool, would fall; therefore, it .behoved us to be careful still: It seemed to him that that was where the commercial travellers came in; in educating the public generally to a proper application of the factors which" produced prosperity, and those which caused depression. The travellers could keep people on tlie rails. It seemed to him that people did not understand how the question of exports and imports affected the prosperity of the country. One of tho last messages of tho late Mr. Massey on New Year's Day, 1925, was a warning to the country that unless we steadied up there was going to be a pretty good crash. His Excellency referred to the interdependency of primary and secondary industries, and the part immigration could play. It was sometimes said, "We cannot take people," but looking on the other side of the-question, unless the population was increased how could the secondary industries flourish? In conclusion, he dwelt on the added interest that could be given to drab work by people working for an ideal, working for the benefit of the country and tho Empire.