The Chronicle PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. TUESDAY, MARCH 30, 1915. COMMERCE AND THE WAR

Horowhenua Chronicle, 30 March 1915, Page 2

The Chronicle PUBLISHED DAILY LEVIN. TUESDAY, MARCH 30, 1915. COMMERCE AND THE WAR

Great Britain's commercial standing i- supreme. though basically it lias ij.'i'ti disturbed by the effects of tlie

war. In volume the trade has decreased dining the last six months, but the enhanced value of primary and secondary product* lias compensated in great measure lor the loss in quantity. Tile constituent parts ol the British Empire overseas have cause for thankfulness that they form an integral part of .so jMospwou.s and so groat an apex of five hundred years of uninterrupted development and progress as the British Umpire. Our lines in the Antipodes are fallen in pleasant places. To us is given the profitable and proper task of increasing the output of our cereal and pastoral lands. By so doing we help very materially the Mother Country, and there remains with us the comforting thought that the middle-aged and older men. though past their prime, can help as fitly in the struggles of the Empire as do the younger and more vigorous men who have gone front overseas, to Egypt and elsewhere, to fight the Empire's battles. lloverting to the topic that begins this article, we reprint for benefit, of out readers the i em arks of a London correspondent. whoso special articles appear in the MercanTile Gazette of Xew Zealand. He writes that in Great Britain. from a commercial point of view, the year 1915 opened auspiciously. The first month brought a decrease in imports of only £604.003. or 8 per cent as compared with January, 1914. anc ] with the exception of June, no month last year recorded so small a decline; and though the smallness of the drop is due largely to the higher price of foodstuffs brought into the country it is also evidence of substantial progress. Foodstuffs alone rose £7,302,035 and the bulk of this was accounted for by grain and flour, tea and «u----gai. Analysis 'of the figures show sonic striking advances in value. l'"or instance, wheat rose 7.7 per cent in quantity but 50.6 per cent in value. Indian corn .jumped 151.8 per cent in quantity and 226.0 per cent in value. Likewise rice advanced in quantitv 159.2 |ier cent and in value 145.1 per cent, leather increased 150.7 per cent and 127.5 per cent respectively, and meat 93 per cent in quantity and 179.5 per cent in value. But the greatest advance has occurred in raw sugar, which, as is known, is imported solely by the Government in order to prevent the importation of the enemv fiigar through neutral countries. Here the quantity was 61.1 per cent higher but the value was put as 229.3 per cent more than a year ago. The Government's sugar purchase*, principally of the Java product, have been severely criticised b.v jam and sweet makers and some persons connected with tlie trade have gone so far as to predict a sugar famine in England before the end of the year! Tt is not easy to discern anything to justify this extreme view. However pleasing this increase in the value of food, drink and tobacco imports may be to the foreign producer and tlie home

merchant it is not viewed without some little wncorn by the public, aud therefore the shipments to this country of raw materials, though the aggregate at £23,180,638, shows a drop of £4,897,985, present- a more favourab'e aspect to the working classes. The fall is attributable as to, £3.690,(317 to cotton and as to £1,020,373 to other textile materials, but even in these branches of the trade the tendency is to a higher level; particularly does this apply to raw material where the decrease is due mainly to the fall of value, which has dropped 36.2 per cent, while the quality is only 2 per cent lower than in January, 1914. Wool, of course, advanced both in quantity and value.