WHEAT OF THE WORLD

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 148, 25 June 1938, Page 13

WHEAT OF THE WORLD

AN, OFFICIAL REVIEW THE MARKET SITUATION (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, June 23. The Imperial Economic Committee's' annual review of the grain crops shows how rapidly conditions in the world market for wheat have changed in recent years. The world's visible stocks of wheat totalled more than 32,000,000 tons at the end of the 1933-34 season. From then they had been so much diminished by August, 1937, that the total, 14,250,000 tons, was the smallest figure for more than ten years. Prices rose sharply during 1936-37 with the fall in supplies, and farmers throughout the world sowed an appreciably larger area with wheat for the 1937-38 crop than in the previous season. Although there was no proportional increase in the world production of wheat, excluding Russia and China, nevertheless the harvest was larger than in any of the three preceding seasons. EXPECTED INCREASE. Consequently, stocks this August are expected to show an increase of soma 2,000,000 tons over last year, much of this increase occurring in America, where the wheat crop in 1937 was bigger than any harvest since 1931. Stocks in Canada and the Argentine are unlikely to differ much from the totals recorded in August, 1937, for in both countries the last crop was small as the result of drought and.frost damage respectively. The review describes recent changes in the wheat trade of the principal countries. America,' having bountiful supplies in the current 1937-38 season, has resumed its old position as'a wheat exporter, whereas last year it was imjporting heavily. Russia has increased its exports, and Australia also has larger supplies available. On the other lhand, both Canada and Argentina have only small exportable surpluses. HARVEST PROSPECTS, As to the future position, the review draws attention to the fact that in few parts of the world has there been any indication that the area devoted to wheat for the 1938-39 crop will be substantially reduced as compared with the last sowings. Since last autumn the price of wheat has shown a downward trend, and recently the decline has been rapid, due very largely to the prospects of a bumper harvest in America this year. It is too early yet to judge what the final outcome will be, but it seems that the world crop, providing the harvests are normal, may be substantially larger than the demand, even if the European demand is assisted by Government purchases to , build up reserves cf wheat against possible emergency needs.

His Majesty's Arcade and Theatre Company, Ltd., Auckland, has advised the Stock Exchange Association that it is paying on July 1 an interim dividend of 2 3-5 per cent, on the preference shares, and 3 per cent, on the, ordinary shares, an unchanged rate.