BRITAIN’S LARDER.

Evening Star, Issue 23099, 27 October 1938, Page 10

BRITAIN’S LARDER.

The British Government’s purchase last week of 200,000 tons of' Rumanian wheat, valued at £1,000,000, for storage by the Food Defence Department is a reminder that the current .speeding up of arms manufacture is being supported by appropriate attention to the national larder. Tho supply from Rumania brings tho country’s war reserve wheat up to over 750,000 tons, which means that a useful quantity of basic provender has been amassed since the first sei’ious effort at creating a reserve was made. The Great War taught Britain how dependent she was on imported foodstuffs, and how vulnerable she was to attack on her sea-borne supplies. The British fanners, despite their eagerness to make their country self-supporting, cannot possibly cope with the demand, and it was largely with the object of making good the unavoidable deficiencies in homo production that the Government, about two years ago, set up a Food Defence Plans Department to formulate schemes for the supply, control, and disti-ibution of food for defence purposes. The new hoax-ding era commenced with tho purchase from Canada of 2,000,000 bushels of wheat. Since then the importation of grain and other commodities has been continued on a regular and satisfactory scale.

In his Budget speech'Sir Johxx Simon announced that the Government had made secret purchases of wheat, sugar, and whale oil “ to ensure that the stocks in this country shall be maintained at a level sufficient for the needs of the civil population during tho early months of an emergency.” Realising the importance of the measure, menxbers of the House of Commons did not cavil at purchases being xnade without statutory authority, because secrecy had ensured a fair price and no disturbance of the markets. Henceforth the Government will be empowered to make reserves cither by inducing traders to increase their own stock or by buying stocks to be held by the Board of Trade, the expenses to be met by a special reserves fund. As the need arises the Govcnxinent may augment

the list of essential commodities, hut for the time being these are limited to “ food for man, forage for animals, fertiliser for land, any raw materials from, which any such commodities can be produced, and. petroleum, with any of its products.” It is obvious that the importations have been wisely chosen. Great Britain is dependent on imports for three-quarters of the wheat and sugar she consumes, and produces only about 10 per cent, of her butter and lard, the chief edible fats. Whale oil, it is interesting to note, is one of the main constituents of margarine, with which people who were in the United Kingdom during 191-1-18 became quite familiar. The raw material hails largely from Holland and Norway. A problem which now engages the attention of the Committee of Imperial Defence concerns the protection of ships laden with foodstuffs and oil fuel when entering or leaving coastal waters and while lying in port, ft is thought in regard to overhead risk to shipping in wartime that a considerable measure of protection can be afforded by putting ships into a convoy and providing escorts with strong anti-aircraft armaments. This will at least discourage low-flying attack. It is held that high bombing can be dangerous only when the weather is suitable. Many authorities consider that the aircraft menace to merchant ships while at sea is not serious, and that it is more important to make tho harbours safe from attack. Even in normal times over 1,000,000 tons of foodstuffs and raw materials arrive every week in the United Kingdom ports, about one-third of those supplies being discharged in the London docks. Thus tho rendering of London and other major ports reasonably safe from mass attack from tlio air is an essential corollary to the protection of shipping on the high. seas. It is evident, however, that the accumulation of largo reserve supplies, such as is represented by the latest wheat purchase from Rumania, is the most reliable insurance against national starvation in a time of emergency.