AGREEMENTS TO PURCHASE TEA

Wanganui Chronicle, 21 January 1947, Page 2

AGREEMENTS TO PURCHASE TEA

London, Jan. 18. Arrangements have been made by Australia, South Africa and the United States to buy tea through ordinary commercial channels when the Colombo tea auctions recommence on January 20. In London this development is regarded as foreshadowing th** end of the International Emergency Food Council’s system of international allocation, with the United Kingdom as sole buyer. Officially no change ot policy has been announced in London. The final decision on Britain’s tea purchases is expected some time this month, according to a statement in lhe House of Commons reported in “The Times,” London, last, week. The free tea auction to start in Colombo on Monday will be small at first, and the proposed export duty will not apply tn the first few auctions. The reason is stated to be a desire to forestall any attempted formation of a buyers’ cartel and to gain knowledge of average prices, but a further reason suggested in London is that it may well be a move to allow time for comnlet’on of arrangement? with the British Ministry of Food, toward which Ceylon has recently adopted a more reasonable attitude.