MILLIONS FOR IMPORTS

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1020, 10 July 1930, Page 24

MILLIONS FOR IMPORTS

WHERE THE MONEY GOES WHY N.Z. IS STAGNANT In a country like this, with all our production of wool, skins and hides, we cannot clothe ourselves or shoe ourselves without importing 10 million pounds’ worth of wearing apparel, boots, hats, caps, etc., a year from outside countries. That is the value of those goods in the country of origin. Then we send abroad to buy another ten millions’ worth of machinery, hardware, and metals manufactured or unmanufactured. That is why our foundries and engineering shops are idle, and our youths cannot find openings in productive employment. New Zealand buys two million pounds’ worth of paper, books and stationery from abroad, and foreign timber exploiters gather another million a year. All these are contributing causes to our national industrial sickness. We are busy sending orders abroad for goods which can be made better and cheaper here by our own workers, from our own materials, and we keep workers in foreign countries busy while our own are starving. For years past we have been indulging in an orgy of over-consumption of imported goods and on that account the country is feeling sick at the present time. TIME FOR ACTION It is time New Zealand bestirred itself and set to work in grim earnest on a self-reliant policy of producing to satisfy our own needs to the fullest extent possible. We cannot cure our industrial starvation by feeding ourselves on commodities from outside. Fresh blood can only he given to our industries by an Increased demand for their output. By changing over from foreign to home-made goods an immediate recover}' would be | assured.