"IMPORTS SOAR"

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 26, 30 July 1937, Page 8

"IMPORTS SOAR"

(To the Editor.) Sir, —In a paragraph which appeared under the above heading in . your columns on July 16, the New Zealand Manufacturers' Federation expressed: concern at the increase in the value of imports over the corresponding periods of last year. Is it not a fact that the greatest menace to local manufacture is from countries which have depreciated their currency or who subsidise their manufacturers and shipping or which have a lower standard of living than that enjoyed locally. This raises the following questions:— 1. Is it the intention of the Ne.w Zealand Manufacturers' Federation to ask for protection against all imports irrespective of the source from which they originate? ' . 2. "Would the federation be content with a tariff against those countries which have, through depreciation of currency or subsidies, secured a portion of this market's requirements at the expense of local manufacture and of Great Britain? . . . . 3. If this tariff was granted could the manufacturers cope with the additional orders? ; 4. How many of. the present unemployed do the manufacturers consider can be absorbed .by diverting imports to local manufacture? , 5. Would the manufactures shelter behind the tariff. or would they give the consumer-the benefit of the add> tional duty? , . . ■ ■ 6. If it is considered that additional duty is necessary to compensate them for increased cost of .manufacture, could the consumer-afford to pay the extra price? . . • ' 7. If duty : was increased on goods which come from Great Britain, would not this widen the breach, in-the present favourable trade balance between this country and Great Britain?—l am, etc., IMPMAN.