SYDNEY'S ISLAND TRADE

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLI, Issue XLI, 15 August 1921, Page 5

SYDNEY'S ISLAND TRADE

■■- -»— ■ ■ COMMERCIAL MEN ANXIOUS. SYDNEY, Au £ . .2. Considerable attention, is being demoted foy. the Sydney Chamber of Cota-1 meroe. which is now in the. midst of its \ annual sessions, to the safeguarding of ! bhe Island trade. One of the delegates, f Mr. William Reed, declared that the | loss of the Island .trade was a searibtts matter to Sydney, and concerned every one of them. A deputa%io'n from the [sland Trade Sectional Committee liad' asked For the removal of the war-time restrictions placed upon the handling of copra, but they had toeen unsuccess- i ful. The copra was not allowed to be ] taken into the sheds in the process of ! lischarge, and there was, consequently, I no protection against the rain, while1 it had to be removed forthwith, from j the wharves. They desired .permission ' to put the c©pra in the sheds during discharging and unloading. The copra was going to other countres, and Sydney j was losing the trade. Copra was the j Island cunreecy. They had no money j bhere. They sent the copra to pay for the goods which were sent to the Islands. One «©ne shipment from Sydney to the Islands there had fbeen £"5000 worth of goods which "had been paidf or with copra. It had been proved tnai copra fires in the pasTi Tiad been due to incendiarism, the act of enemy agents. Mr. Boxnall. a member of the Samaxai Chaittber oi Commerce, Papua, remarked that there were Island-inter-ests to Tie considered as well as those of Sydney. Were they justified in asking the Islands to send goods half-way rouna Ithe world :agatn iso the place of manufacture, in order to allow, the people of Sydney" to coilelct dues and j exchange fhe goods for goods of their own? The president, Mr. J. "Mainland Paxton, stated that it was quite true that t"he regulations tjf the Sydney Harbour '$rust !had practically driven the copra trade 'out of 'Sydney.. "What was happening was causing serious disqiiiet in certain 'Official quarters, anfl the matter 'was under Teview there.