AUSTRALIA’S FALLING IMPORTS .

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1701, 21 April 1917, Page 4

AUSTRALIA’S FALLING IMPORTS .

The trade balance of the Commonwealth as discernible from the official figures of import and export values is now trending in favour of Australia (says the Argus). For some time the high cost of both necessities and luxuries from abroad, the drought in 1.914-15, the scarcity of ships, and the borrowing of the Governments from Great Britain, have combined, with other and less patent factors, to cause a surplus of imports over exports to be shown in the statistics issued by the Customs Department. Australian merchants bought very freely in the rising markets abroad, and have, now the benefit of large stocks at costs which cannot bo repeated. For the very reasons that these stocks will take a moderate period to dispose of, and that the extreme level of the overseas markets does not encourage buying, it is obvious that importations into Australia will decline substantially in the near future. That this movement has already begun is clear to anyone associated with shipping. It is not an uncommon occurrence for a ship to come to Australia either in ballast or only half full of cargo, and to leave loaded well down to the Plimsoll mark with Australian produce. Taking the Customs figures for the month of February, it is found that the value of the exports exceeded the imports by £3,927,510, while the total excess of exports over imports during the last three months was £(>,871,504, as compared with £790,190 for the corresponding three months a year previously. These figures apply solely to merchandise, the gold and specie movements not being included. If the period since the beginning of the

financial year (July Ist) is taken, it. is seen that although the influence of the slack export period from July to November is still strong, the actual exports exceed the imports for the first- time since the outbreak of war. This is displayed in the following table: Imports. Exports. Merchandise. Merchandise. 1911- 48,020.018 50,948,405 1912- 52,125,390 51,227,870 1913- 52,413,733 00,733,372 1914- 43,934,244 38,208,914 1915- 50,870,184 41,055,097 1910-17 55,710,904 50,301,535 Imports of merchandise aggregating in value £55,710,904 will be recognised by anyone at all conversant with the tendency of prices during the last few years to represent a very material contraction in the actual volume of goods to the £52,413,733 worth imported in the corresponding months of 1913-14. Another and a positive sign that imports are declining is the fact that in the course of the last two months freight from New York to Australia has been substantially reduced on two occasions.