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Hokitika Guardian, 13 August 1925, Page 2

Thu Westminster Bank lieview for June, gives prominence to a critical examination of the situation in Russia. Available figures referring to agricultural and industrial conditions in that country are not very reliable, but it is shown that both are in an unsatisfactory condition, and this is admitted by the Bolsheviks themselves, both direetlv and indirectly. The fact is

clear that industry does not pay its way, and it is difficult to see how there can he any approach to pre-war trade under present- conditions. The potential demand in Bussia itself for the products of its industries is enormous, hut- prices are much above the general world level ; capital and savings have gone; wages are terribly low and often in arrears—in a word, there is nut the wherewithal to buy. Grandiose schemes are projected, placing agriculture and industry on a new and advanced basis, in which a great part is to he taken by the electrification of the whole country. For the hitter purpose, 11 million roubles have been assigned in the last budget. The old manual implements of the peasant arc to give way to tractors, electric ploughs etc. Factories are to he equipped with the latest and most perfected machinery. This year, 109 million roubles have been allotted for the developmo. of industrial works. Bykoff admits that this will require the application o.

enormous capital. If both agriculture and industry have to be subsidised by the Government', it is difficult to sop whence they are to obtain the requisite funds. In Rykoff's opinion, foreign capital is much to lie desired, and he is confident of securing it- by the mere offer of good interest. At the same time, he is even more confident that the advance from the present -stage to the perfection of technical equipment and pre-war production can lie accomplished through Bussia's own resources. and that, indeed, it will he easier than the progress from the conditions of 1921 to those of 1925. Meanwhile, as if to inspire confidence in the investor. Bykoff repeats the Bolshevist attitude to the Imperial debts, namely, that the Bolsheviks have refused hitherto to pay any debts ii eurred on any account whatsoever before the revolution, hut Unit they do not exclude the possibility of making a bargain with the creditors on the basis of mutual advantage; as, however, they do not recognise any indebtedness on their part they do not admit that there can he any juridical basis o.' discussion of the question.

Tin; Dominion of Statistics at Ottawa have issued a report dealing with primary forest production in Canada dm ing the calendar year 1923. The estimate-, made include all unmanufactured material cut in the Canadian forests during the year named, and they indicate the rate at which the forest resources of the Dominion are being exploited. As in previous years, logs and holts for domestic manufacture, the raw materials of the saw-milling and allied industries, head the list of products for Canada as a whole with a total value of nearly seventy million dollars. These products also head the lists, as far as value is concerned, ii the provinces of British Columbia, Ontario, and Now Brunswick. Pulp for use in Canada's pulp and paper mills conies second on the list for the Dominion. with a total value exceeding forty three millions. Pulp wood is the- most valuable item of forest- production in the province of (Jncbeo. Firewood, with a total of thirty-eight million dollars, conics third on the list for the Dominion as a whole, hut heads the list in the. three Prairie Provinces, and in Nova Scotia and Prince Kdwnt'd Island. Pulpwood for export, with a. total value of thirteen and a half millions; railway sleepers, with thirteen millions; logs for export, with five millions; square timber, with four millions; anil telegraph and telephone poles, with a total approaching' three million dollars, are among the most- important of the other items. The total estimated value of those primary forest products was 197,459,331 dollars, an increase of 15. G per cent over the estimated value for 1922. An attempt has been made to estimate the extent to which Canadian forests are depleted annually in the progress of exploiting these materials, and it has been estimated that- the total primary forest production in Canada in 1923 involved the cutting of 2,G71.054.802 cubic feet of standing timber. This constitutes only the consumption for use, and to it must he added the volume of material destroyed by fire, insects, fungi, windfall, and other destructive agencies. which would bring the total depletion to more than five thousand million cubic feet per annum.