WHEAT SITUATION

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18179, 29 August 1933, Page 6

WHEAT SITUATION

DOMINATING FACTORS CANADIAN REVIEW SIR H. SAMUEL’S WARNING (Elbc. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (Received August 29'. 1.30 p.m.) OTTAWA, Aug. 28. The world .wheat situation is dominated by two considerations, states the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. Thefirst is the greatly reduced North American cereal production through drought and excessive heat over the central areas of the United States and large areas of the Canadian prairies. The second is the prospect that Europe has harvested a bountiful crop, rendering import requirements abnormally low. The 1933 season lias been one of the most disastrous in the agricultural history of Canada- and the United States. A warning against the dangers of the London wheat pact was made in Calgary by Sir Herbert Samuel in an address in which he declared that the threat of great home surpluses had more to do with the depression in wheat prices than any other factor. ‘‘The now Wheat agreements are admirable in their object,” Sir Herbert, said, “but they do hot make plain how increased wheat prices arc to be obtained. ‘ The farmer, assured of higher .prices, will naturally raise more grain. Diminished production, however, must go along with reduced exports, or a great home surplus would be built up.” This, lie said, was exactly wlrat happened with the United States Farm Board and the 'Canadian pools. Of the Ottawa agreements, ‘Sir Herbert said they had compelled Britain to a negative policy, discouraging foreign trade. “We cannot hamper or •destroy this trade, which is three times that of our trade with the Empire,” he added. “Politically the Dominions are free; economically, however, the situation is not so plain. Britain’s unemployment is largely due to the stoppage of emigration since the Great War. Indications of returning prosperity are, however, evident in England.'”

REDUCTION IN ACREAGE (Received August 29, 2 p.m.) ■ Washington, August 28. The Secretary of Agriculture, Mr. Wallace, to-day formally announced that a reduction of 15 per cent, in the seeded acreage will be required of farmers joining the United States Government’s wheat plan. USE MORE WH^AT THOUGH AREAS ARE CUT JjHNDON, August 21. “Too much attention is given to the over-production of wheat while the question of its tinder-consumption is neglected,” writes Mr, Hubert Robson, president of the London Corn Trade Association in a letter to the Times. The catastrophic decline in overseas grain movements, accompanied by the still greater decline in values,!he says, grievously afflicted the commercial activities of every trading country and injured not only grani traders, but underwriters, banking and finance houses, and partially paralysed shipping The natural law that consumption increases as prices fall has been suspended, owing {o the activities of the. Canadian Wheat Pool and the U.S. Farm Board, combined with restrictions on the Continent, whose inhabitants had not enjoyed cheap bread since .before the war. ' ' ' 1 It is generally agreed, says the Times in a leading article, that the fall in agricultural prices has been as disastrous to industrial countries ns to agricultural ones. There can be no issue from the depression until there is a recovery in prices, such as an effective agreement, for the more orderly production and marketing of wheat would help to. achieve. The problem can only be solved if attacked from both ends. Restrictions on production must be accompanied by the 'encouragement of consumption.