Wairarapa Daily Times [ESTABLISHED OVER 50 YEARS.] MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1926. ITALIAN SHIPBUILDING.

Wairarapa Daily Times, 6 December 1926, Page 4

Wairarapa Daily Times [ESTABLISHED OVER 50 YEARS.] MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1926. ITALIAN SHIPBUILDING.

4 ♦ Even more significant than the mea # - sures which are being taken to strengthen the Italian Fleet, is the programme of merchant shipbuilding which is now being carried out in Italian shipyards. <Sir Wostcott Abell, chief ship surveyor of Lloyd’s Register of shipping, recently; remarked that ‘‘ r lhc outstanding event in the world mercantile marine over .the past two or three years lias undoubtedly been the revival of shipping and shipbuilding in Italy at a time when most other nations were concerned mainly in cutting their losses.” Under the decree of 1923, Italian shipbuilding is? being heavily subsidised out of State funds, and new ships are rapidly being sent afloat at a time when there is at least 19,000,000 tons more shipping in the world than the trade of the world can employ. Last year Italy' launched nearly' three times as much merchant shipping aS in 1913, and, though shipbuilding in other countries is severely depressed, the Italian output this year will probably represent a fresh record. What is to be the outcome of all this activity upon what is essentially an international industry which can only be nationalised at the expense of a country’s taxpayers? The United States has illustrated the penalty which a country pays for the artificial stimulation of shipbuilding. The American taxpayers, it lias been revealed, have already spent nearly £850,000,000 upon the building and operating of their State-owned fleet. The losses are going on year by r year, while the value of tho ships, as well as their efficiency, is decreasing as 1 they get older. It lias proved impossible to find employment for this -costly fleet,, with (he result that, while America possesses 600 per cent more tonnage than she did in 1914, the amount which can be kept moving by yea, even at a loss, is only two and a/ half times what it was. Will Italy, in attempting to realise Signor Mussolini's ambitions, share the same fate? If is true that the ships which She is building will be privately owned, but can remunerative employment be found for them? The main support of Italian shipping before the war was the emigration traffic, but the United States

has no'..' practically closed her doors. If Italian .shipowners in these unfavourable circumstances incur 'loss'es, they will betempeted to demand from the Government increased protection, with inevitable injury to Italian industry and to the burdening of the Italian consumer. The interest of the Italians, as .if others, lies in the fullest and freest access to the cheap international freight market, and Signor Mus’solini’s policy appears to tend in the opposite direction, and •may conceivably find expression in attempts to force the Italian people to use only Italian vessels' at a price.