PRICES COMPARED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19758, 12 October 1938, Page 5

PRICES COMPARED

NEW ZEALAND EXPORTS FIGURES OF PEAK YEAR POSITION OK INDUSTRY RISING TIDE OF COSTS (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. The following combined statement has been issued by the New Zealand Farmers" Union and the New Zealand Manufacturers' Federation:— "The statement that prosperity is here and that the farmer and manufacturer are benefiting because the Government has placed purchasing power in the hands of the working people cannot be allowed to pass unchallenged. In regard to primary industries, it has been adm.Ued that farm costs are equal to those ruling at the time of the peak prices in 1929. In addition to this, graduated land tax has been imposed. When, however the prices ruling in 1929 and the prices ruling at the present time are compared, the result is illuminating.

"The following prices have been brought to the same currency basis for the purposes of comparison:—

"Butter, per cwt.: 1928-29, 158 s 184 s stg.; 1937-38, 112 s stg. (guaranteed price); 1938-39. 124 s 3d stg. (guaranteed price). "Wool, per bale: 1928-29, £2l stg.: 1937-38, £ll 3s stg.; 1938-39, ? Lower in Value "The value of our exports expressed in terms of New Zealand currency was £3.000,000 less last year than in 1929, while at the same tune the farming community produced in volume of goods half as much again as in 1929. So far as the volume of production is concerned, however, it should be pointed out that our dairy production is starting to diminish. Last year the volume of dairy production declined by 6.6 per cent. "In regard to manufacturing industries, while there is no doubt that the year ending March 31, 1937, was one "of high production and high employment, warnings given to the Government by leading manufacturers have since then been justified only too amply. "In one city the following are the employment figures for three industries as at June, 1937 and 1938 respectively:—so6 workers, reduced to 376; 339 workers, reduced to 219; 305 workers, reduced to 258. Competition of Imports "Every local industry subject to competition of imports from lowercost countries is faced with a most serious situation. The gap between costs and selling prices has now so severely shrunk that the inducement to enterprise is being slowly strangled. "Meanwhile, New South Wales is in a very different position, simply because industry there has not been subjected to unceasingly increasing costs. "In July, 42 large factories, which the Government Statistician uses as a regular basis of comparison, were employing 11,100 more workers than in July of last year, an increase of 5 per cent in the number of employed In New Zealand on the . other hand, the relentless course of everincreasing costs is a march out of industry into public works, paid for by the unemployment funds, and when industry is destroyed the source of the unemployment funds is destroyed also."