SOUTH AFRICA’S TRADE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 June 1938, Page 7

SOUTH AFRICA’S TRADE

BUMPER YEAR RECORDED. IMPORTS HIGHEST KNOWN. With imports and exports both over the £100,009,000 mark, and with a visible favourable trade balance of more than £20,000,000, South Africa had a bumper , trade year Un 1937. These facts are revealed in trade statistics for last year issued in Pretoria.

According to these figures, imports for. the year reached the highwater mark of £103,382,242, the first time the hundred million mark has been passed. In 1936, itself a good year, imports aggregated only £86,299,361. Exports tell the same tale of prosperity. The 1937 export aggregate was £125,395,436, as against £114,191,811 the year before.

The Union’s favourable visible balance of trade last year was thus £22,013,194, as compared with £27,892,450 the year before. As usual, the United Kingdom was South Africa’s best customer. Last year the United Kingdom took 81.2 per cent of the Union’s exports, and sold South Africa 42.4 .per cent of this country’s exports. The British Empire bought 84.1 per cent of South African's exports and sold to the Union 51 per cent of its imports.

Among foreign countries the United States led the way in respect of imports into the Union. That country supplied 20.7 per cent of South Africa’s imports, representing an expenditure of £19,981,277. Then came Germany with 5.5 per cent, Japan with 4 per cent, and Belgium with 2.7 per cent.

When it comes to importing South African goods, however, the situation is rather different. While the U.S.A, sold nearly £20,000,000 worth of goods to this country last year, it bought in return only £1,338,529 worth, or 1.1 per cent. Germany bought for £4,930,196 (4.1 per cent), Japan for £3,308,471 (2.8 per cent), and France for £2,467,280 (2.1 per cent). France, in fact, was a particularly good foreign customer, buying about three times as much goods as it sold South Africa.