THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, MARCH 24, 1930. EMPIRE MARKETING.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20521, 24 March 1930, Page 8

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, MARCH 24, 1930. EMPIRE MARKETING.

In the estimates for Dominions services presented in the House of Commons is an amount of £550,000 for the Empire Marketing Board. The amount is little more than half of what was intended to be available and spent annually when the board was established in 1926, on a recommendation of the Imperial Economic Committee that such a body should be formed " with the duty of conducting the movement for trade in Empire produce." As official adviser to the Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs it was then to be entrusted with the spending of £1,000,000 a year. But, to judge by the fact that, beside the £550,000 proposed to be voted this year, a further amount of £250,000 is available as the unexpended balance of last year's vote, it is apparent that to spend £1,000,000 a year is proving a somewhat difficult task. However, as this unexpended balance exists in spite of the undoubted vigour of the board, there may be very safely

assumed a wise care to see that the money available is spent to practical advantage, and not frittered away. The board has a wide range of activities. They include, as a matter of fact, much more than marketing as usually

• understood. Scientific research is [ foremost in the order of these activities as covered in its annual report; and under this come inquiries concerning the pastures of the Empire, veterinary, entomological and low temperature investigations, the. assistance given to Cambridge University laboratories and library, and grants made to scientific travellers going abroad on special missions related to research. Included in these missions have been the tours of- Dr. Hill of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Ivew, and Dr. Nichols of the British Research Association for the Woollen and Worsted Industries, both of whom came to New Zealand. Economic inquiries have also been aided, these being intimately relevant to marketing, while transport and publicity have absorbed their full quotas of attention and outlay. It is apparent, from even the most cursory survey of these avenues of expenditure, that the board has an extensive programme, and it is satisfactory to know that its efforts are not likely to be at all crippled, although the proposed vote is below the original figure. What appears most plainly from every report of the Empire Marketing Board is the urgent necessity of pursuing the policy enunciated at its founding—the assistance to the utmost of efforts to provide within the Empire a compensating facility of commerce to offset the loss of trade in foreign markets disorganised by the war and the subsequent pressure of foreign competition. In particular, Parliament expressly placed on the board the duty of furthering the marketing in the United Kingdom of Empire products, including home agricultural produce. On the broad question of marketing as usually understood there has been recently issued an interim report of a committee set up, at the instance of Lord Eustace Percy, to examine ways and means of improving salesmanship as it is related to the interests of British marketing. Certain striking sentences in that report reach the heart of the subject. "It is easier to make than to market " is cited as the wise dictum of one witness examined by the committee, and emphasis is placed on the folly of " a detached and insular attitude and unscientific practice—relics of the time long past when we enjoyed a virtual monopoly of the world's markets for manufactured goods." That criticism is particularly directed against the British manufacturer, and is clinched with the forcible reminder that " British goods no longer sell themselves." But it applies to every country and to every sort of product, whether raw material or finished article, and the Empire Marketing Board, with its ej'e on the possibilities of encouraging the flow of required products from outlying British countries to the Homeland, has proceeded on the same principles. No goods can sell themselves, least of all the goods that have to be shipped a long way to British markets, open to almost frictionless competition from every country under heaven and so close to many highly-productive countries that produce from the far Dominions and colonies enters heavily handicapped.

Little need be said, at this time of day in Imperial expansion and development, about the vast natural resources of the oversea British countries, or of the increasingly effective means of enlarging their output. These things have become truisms. The only point worth j emphasis now, in this respect, is the rapidity with which this productivity is advancing, in spite of all the setbacks inflicted at intervals by bad times and unemployment, laking a long view, disregarding any temporary halt, there has been a persistent spreading of the range of Empire supplies. Under that head no misgiving need bo felt. Yet it must be obvious that, unless marketing facilities and salesmanship in the widest sense be provided, this developing productivity will be of little advantage r J he required task has two urgencies: one, the encouraging and assisting of the producer, and this the board seeks to accomplish through its research and associated activities; the other, a vigorous stimulation of an effective demand for the goods so produced. In both ways, this Dominion should profit appreciably. In researches planned to increase production,

either directly or by th 6 combating of menacing conditions, as in the ravages of pests, it has received welcome aid, and other benefits of this sort are in view. On the other hand, much has been done by the board to advertise and popularise in the United Kingdom the> products of New Zealand. All things considered, although difficulty may have been met in expending to practical advantage the full amount set aside at first for annual outlay, it is clear that a return of considerable value is being made by Britain for the preferential tariffs of the Dominions, and it is well that this return is to continue.