JAPANESE COMMERCE

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIV, Issue 116, 16 April 1934, Page 2

JAPANESE COMMERCE

3.45 P.M. EDITION

EXPLANATION BY CONSUL. Per Press Association. WELLINGTON, April 16. Discussing Japanese trade, Mr Kuramatsu Murai, the Consul-General for Japan in Australia and New Zealand, said that one of the primary facts governing the low price of Japanese goods was the fall in the exchange rate of the yen caused by the re-imposition of the gold embargo in December, 1931. There had also been a powerful rationalisation movement in Japanese industries, which brought about reforms, deflation by increasing the purchasing power of the yen, and permitted some reduction in wages. Regarding allegations of dumping, he said: I don’t deny there is competition and it is a fact that we can sell our goods very cheaply, but this is only an abnormal phenomenon brought about by the world economic depression. It cannot last for ever. There is no ground for the accusation that there is unfair competition. He said that no important cases of Japanese selling abroad at less than cost had been proved. There was any amount of evidence, too, that the. accusations regarding labour conditions in Japan were groundless. If the world recovered from the economic depression the keen edge of Japanese competition would be removed. Stocks of raw materials were, now having to be imported at enhanced prices on account of the fall of exchange and this would increase the cost of production and reduce competitive power.