SHIPS, TRADE, AND PEACE

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 53, Issue 3821, 14 October 1936, Page 7

SHIPS, TRADE, AND PEACE

A SHIPOWNER’S DECLARATION. “Let us get down to business and see what has to be done and who must do it,” says Sir Alan Anderson, the well - known British shipowner, in “The Listener.” The rich creditor nations must do it. The world’s exchange has been broken and they must mend it chief among them the United States of America, France and Great Britain. In two generations before the war Great Britain, the rich creditor State, lent freely to the pioneers who pushed out to settle new countries, bought freely from their farms, and by buying from her debtors herself assured the payment of her debts. The charm worked as it will always work, the world progressed faster than ever before, shipping flourished. In these last years certain creditor nations have refused to receive payment in goods, have continued to export without importing enough, have lent abroad and forgotten to assure repayment by adequate purchases; so debtor nations have been unable to pay, the world’s exchange has broken down; the world trade has shrunk in the last six years by one-fifth in volume; farms don’t pay; ships are at a discount. The cure—and, as we British shipowners think, the only cure—is to restore world trade which means prosperity to all nations and the will to peace. We are not Free Traders; we are not protectionists. We shipowners are Traders—so are we Britons traders—and must be. The foundations on which trade rests are peace, stability, and the will of the creditor nation to take payment from her debtors in the only coin current in the world’s exchange, which is in goods and services. Great Britain has been forced by the world to regulate the flow of goods into her market and to bargain with her debtors, but we still accept so much more from the world in goods and services than we export as enables our debtors to pay their debts to us. The U.S.A., another great creditor nation, has stated by the speeches of her President, and his Ministers, that she will mend her ways and accept payment in goods and services. She is, in fact, making Trade Treaties and importing more. “The prescription which we shipowners offer to the world being trade, we would, if we were not shy, suggest to U.S.A., Great Britain and France, riot to call another world economic conference without a policy; not to advertise a glittering fabric of stable currency without the necessary foundations of trade but to come together and keep together till they shall have agreed what each can do in the common effort to save us all. The very fact that these three great Powers, and grouped in their support the British Dominions, .the countries with whom we have Trade Treaties and the gold standard countries, the very fact that the great movers of world trade have determined to restore trade and peace for all nations will revive hope and keep the currencies stable till they can once more be established by law.

“In these recent years of peace which is no peace, millions in Europe are underfed, discouraged, angry—• thousands of farmers overseas are paid not to raise corn and pigs. It is the task of the great trading nations to feed their people and to restore trade which will bring together complementary needs; encourage the farmers to produce; the settler to open new country and by the same magic of trade enable the hungry millions of Europe to know plenty and the joys of peace.”