EMPIRE'S PEOPLE

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 134, 3 December 1936, Page 9

EMPIRE'S PEOPLE

MARKETS AND MEN

INCREASED PRODUCTION

ECONOMIC PUZZLE

(By "Etlmos.")

LONDON, November 11,

Both in Britain and in the. Dominions we have built and planned, so far as these things have'been planned at all, our economic and political structures on, the assumption that the Empire as a whole and its various parts were going to continue to inincrease rapidly in population, and, therefore, also, in producing and in consuming power.

Are we going now to'adjust these things to the assumption that the population of Britain is to decline and that of the Dominions is to rise very slowly,-indeed? And if so, how are the sweeping adjustments necessary to be made?

Or is some way to be devised of overcoming the tendency towards a declining or a stationary population? If so, what is it? We have had a good deal of rhetoric on the, subject of population during the last decade.

One of our statesmen coined the '.phrase, "Populate or Perish." But it has hot prevented the birth-rate from falling, either in Britain or in ■ the Dominions.

The effect on the population' has been temporarily masked to some extent in both cases by a decline in the death-rate. But that decline cannot go on indefinitely. Perhaps it would be: a very bad thing if it could. Even the prospect of a widespread adoption of the Voronoff treatment would not reconcile one to the idea of a country, with a population iri which the majority of the people were over 80.

On the side of production, science and machinery seem well on the way to solve the question of producing more with a stationary or declining number of workers. Science, indeed,, by speeding up production, has'caused one of the major problems of the moment, though it is far from the most embarrassing of them.

On the consumption side, the slowing dpv^n in the growth of population . is going to raise some awkward questions. Let us suppose that in the next 50 years Britain sees her population decline by even 5,000,000. BRITISH MARKET. Let us also suppose that'the revival of British agriculture means, as it inky well do, that Britain can produce almost all the food needed for this smaller population; What becomes of the Dominion's market for butter, meat, eggs, wheat, and flour and other food products of which we hope to,increase the output and export? The Dominions, not -- to mention foreign countries, will be scrambling for an ever-decreasing market. . l ■ This very week Mr. Nash, New Zealand's Finance Minister, has arrived to seek for his Dominion an increased, outlet for her. primary products in return for a larger market for Bri•'tish goods in New Zealand. He is not likely; to secure- any bilateral agreement in any case. ■ It is not the policy of the British Government, especially in view .of the. Empire Conference ■• to be held Jn [iStmiipn in May,' 1937,-"to give; special, °;ierrns: to: one Dominion. -J It's" policy., is' to' treat themall' on the same footing, as far as possible. • , ■ > ■On a longer view the. British Government, which has just appointed' a ' special' expert committee to investigate the threatened decline in the population of Britain, must be uneasily conscious; that'there may soon be a contracting rather than an expanding market in Britain for primary food products from New Zealand, or anywhere else. Even when it comes to mutton we have the word of the Welsh wizard, Mr. Lloyd George,'for the statement that the hill pastures of Wales could carry three sheep where they now carry one, if the discoveries and practices of Professor Stapleton, of the Aberystwyth Research Station (whose motto is "All flesh is grass"), were generally applied. • A DOMESDAY BOOK. Mr. Lloyd George wants a Domesday Book of Britain to be compiled on up-to-date lines, and says that the country could produce most of the meat and other food that it now imports. He pointedly asks why it is that New Zealand can send meat thousands of miles and compete with the British farmer, and, gives as one reason that New Zealand farmers show more interest than British farmers in using the improved grass seeds given to the world by Professor Stapledon.

Another thing that impresses many publicists here is the 'determination of the Dominions, and especially of Canada and of Australia, the only two with any considerable white population, to build up their own secondary industries. They see in this an ever diminishing market there, especially if the population increase slows dojwh, for British manufactured goods.

Some look rather towards the colonies, with their considerable coloured population and their'far less developed condition, which suggests that It will at least be some time before they have many secondary industries. These, they think, may offer better prospects for British industries to sell their products. CONFERENCE PROBLEMS. It would seem that marked and important re-alignments and revaluations were at hand. India has an immense population, nearly a fifth of that of the world. But there are two things to consider.

The purchasing power1 of most of the peop.le of India is exceedingly small by our standards. Secondly, there is a good deal of economic nationalism in India and few see there much hope o* an expanding market for British goods. The prospects of any large market for Australian goods there are also not of the best.

Before the Dominion Ministers assemble for the conference in London, we will hear much more of some of these matters. If it still seems, next May, that production is going to outpace population in expansion, things will not be easy.