IMPENDING CRISIS IN RUSSIA.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 770, 3 December 1886, Page 9

IMPENDING CRISIS IN RUSSIA.

It is a bad omen for the Russian Exchequer that the volume of foreign trade, - which in Russia depends directly upon the state of agriculture, is decreasing from year to year. The values of exports and imports in 1883 amounted to £114,600,000 ; in 1884, to £lO4 600,000; in 1885, to only £89,000,000. The values of cereals have ah o declined. In 1883, the average annual price of the beet Russian wheat at St Petersburg and Odessa was 4s 6£d per bushel ; in 1884. 3-BJd ; in 1885, 3s 7d. It is well known tint business men, as well as agriculturi-ts, in Russia regard it as the duty of the Government to assist them in case of trouble. V7hen in 1885 the Russian Government was informed by the exchanges of Warsaw and Ki-ff that there was a crisis in the eugar indus ry owing to over production, the Government granted a premium of £d per pound on all sugar ex ported abroad, relieving it at the same time of internal duty. The result haa been that, within a year, 1 the Russian Exchequer finds itself short of over £7,000,000, £6C0,000 having been paid in premiums, while £400,000 represents the loss of duty on BUgar. The sugar-making companies have thereby been enabled to pay the usual dividends to shareholders ; but,” although the export of sugar has been increased over three times, its price at home has fallen from 2£d per pound a year ago to 2£d now. Yet over-production goes on merrily, having risen from 7,000,000 .lb in 1882-83 to an estimated production of 1,096,000,0001 bin 1885 86. The surplus for export in the coming season will probably reach 300,000,0001 b. What to do with it is an enigma, for London, the principal market for Russian sugar, being over-supplied last year, will buy little this year. The Russian Government, seeing the uselessness of its assistance, has stopped the premium on exported sugar since July Ist, and nothing will prevent a crisis in the Russ : an sugar trade. Next to the sugar manufacturers, the producers of iron appealed to the Government for help. The iron manufacturers asked the latter to advance them money on their stocks at 2 percent, instead of the usual 6 per eenr. With the uselessness of a premium on sugar before it eyes, the Russian Government will think twice before acceding to the request of the iron men ; but it has lately increased the import duty on iion 25 per cent. Yet English merchants, after freight and import duty, are able to Bell their pig iron in Russia cheaper than the Russian merchants. The cotton industry in Russia cries for Government assistance. The annual value of cotton fabrics manufactured in the oountry is about £30,000,000. Cotton is raised in Turkestan, Central Asia and the Caucasus ; but, instead of this important industry being -encouraged and fostered, it is neglected, and Russia pays at present annually about 75,000,000 roubles in gold (£11,250,000), which is about three times the annual yield of gold in that country. It is a matter of fact that the administra tion of the railways entails an annual loss on that Government of £5 000,000 ; that its mining department is in a deplorable condition, und its banking -operations are a decided failure. It is a matter of record well known in London that the Russian rouble has fallen here lg per cent since January, and this in time of peace. The Russian Government pays about £3 600,000 per annum on account of the decline of the paper rouble, and the above fall in its value has cost 568,750 roubles (£58,313) in six months. Yet, in spite of this loss, the Government is very slow in redeeming its paper rouble. Notwithstanding that in 1881 it decided to redeem paper roubles as fast as they came to the Treasury, up te the present time (in five years) it has redeemed only 87,000 000 roubles, while it keeps locked in the Bank of the Empire 130,000,000 more. The above rate of redemption, however, amounts practically to nothing when we see that Russia annually borrows over 200,000,000 roubles, and that at 5, 6 and even 7 per cent. The writer in Bradstreet arrives at the conclusion that the facts he cites point to an economic point in Russia which nothing can prevent from being of an overwhelming nature, not even Jthe Russian Government. Even Russian journals admit that it will plunge the country into poverty for a long time to come.—London Times.