PROBLEMS TO SOLVE IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 19134, 29 July 1930, Page 9

PROBLEMS TO SOLVE IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE.

** Wo must look to internatiefrial bankers and financial experts to find a solution for the difficulties tinder which we are labouring,” said Mr W. A. Souter, opening the annual meeting of the Baltic and International Maritime Conference at Copenhagen, with a tale of great depression for world shipping. He led up to this expression of faith with an analysis of the reasons why at the present moment the old remedy' of “ continuous hard work I** 1 ** fails to bring relief from the economic consequences of the war. ** Tb-day,” he declared, w we see the spectacle of a huge over-production (I prefer to call it under-consumption), of wheat, maize, 6ugar. rubber, tea, cotton and other commodities on tb« one side—it would almost seem as if nature's bountiful increase is going to waste—and, on the other, amongst the industrial nations millions of «nieo> ployed. It would be idle to pretend that the peoples of the world are adequately fed, clothed and housed* There is a need for these excess quarttitles of goods. Trade, however, can only be carried on by' the exchange of goods, and it would seem that the processes of exchange have to some extent broken down. The legacy* of the war was a burden laid on the shoulders of the present and future generations to make good the losses and ravages of the war, and to repay the huge debts incurred. As with individuals, so with nations, the process of restoration can only be achieved by' continuous hard work, and yet we are unable to see to the fullest’ extent the facilities and opportunities for work which lie ready at our hands owing to the want of a flux which will make a complete amalgam.”

This flux Mr Souter looks for from international bankers and financial experts, and ue hopefully refers to the Commission appointed seven months ago by Mr Snowden, which is still investigating in all their breadth, depth, height and vagueness monetary principles. But do their investigations cover the simple question whether the goods now produced are those that are wanted by the individual who can pay for them ? And if the answer to this question be “ No,” have they authority to recommend that either (1) different goods be produced, or C2) purchasing power be transferred to the pople who want the goods now being produced? Or are they empowered to report on how purchasing power can be transferred? The required flux lies deeply embedded in the region of an honest

inquiry' into these tremendous questions. The third of them embraces all that to-day greatly' matters of economic theory'.