AMERICAN WHEAT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 23 December 1938, Page 5

AMERICAN WHEAT

DISTRIBUTION OF SURPLUS IN SPAIN AVERTING THE STARVATION OF NON-COMBATANTS. AUSTRALIAN ASSISTANCE SUGGESTED. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. WASHINGTON, December 21. The State Department has announced that it plans to distribute surplus United States wheat in order to prevent starvation and the spread of disease among Spain's civilian population, and has also invited other nations to give food or money. The Government is purchasing 3,000,000 bushels of wheat in the next six months and turning it over to the Red Cross for storage and transportation, after which the wheat will be milled into 600,000 barrels of flour and distributed impartially among Spanish non-combatants. This announcement elicited the observation from British and American circles that the nutritional problem in Spain has been giving concern, not only to humanitarian bodies in the British Empire and the United States, but also to departmental experts who have been connected with the League of Nations’ work. A report is in circulation that Australian circles advocate that the Commonwealth should make a contribution of dried milk for under-nourished women and children of both factions in Spain. It was stressed that the need for essential vitamins is becoming paramount among civilians, and. such a contribution would be of first-rate importance for the relief of suffering and perhaps would be more important than wheat. ATTENTION IN BRITAIN. CONSULTATION WITH U.S.A. & FRANCE. (British Official Wireless.) LONDON, December 21. The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Mr R. A. Butler, said in the House of Commons today that Britain was in consultation with America and France regarding the dispatch of supplies of food to the civil population in Spain.