PATEA MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. THURSDAY, MAY 6, 1880. TEE COLONY'S TRADE.

Patea Mail, Volume VI, Issue 516, 6 May 1880, Page 2

PATEA MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. THURSDAY, MAY 6, 1880. TEE COLONY'S TRADE.

The story of our lives from year to year is written in the official table of exports and imports. Are we getting as much for what we produce as we were getting this time last year ? If so, there cannot be much distress, and the colony as a whole must be suffering in imagination rather than in fact. The latest official returns of colonial trade show that this is so. Trade within the colony is depressed, but onr population is really receiving as much for its produce as it ever did, except a trifling decrease which is daily changing towards an increase. It is time to cease mourning, to lay aside old griefs and welcome present blessings. Let the dead Past bury its dead : our business as a practical people is with the living busy Present. The colony’s total imports during the quarter ended March were valued at £1,577,918, as compared with £2,556,052 in same quarter last year. The imports to Wanganui river, from the United Kingdom, amounted to £3,222 for the quarter. The imports to Wellington from the U.K. were £200,657 ; and those to New Plymouth, £3,222. The other chief imports are from. Melbourne and Sydney. The total • imports, from all sources, to Wanganui during the quarter were £12,450, being less than half the amount of same period last year; the imports to Wellington were £261,021, about half the amount of previous period. This comparative frilling off tells a.sad tale, on the face of it, but the sadness is a delusion, aS will appear on reviewing the other side of the ' colony’s business. 1 That tlio tide has turned, and that it

is again flowing prosperously, is shown .with cheerful .conclusivcness by the value of the colony’s exports during the past quarter. The total exports amounted to £2,236,780, as compared with ‘ £2,4 45,677 in the previous period. This

, comparison affords a truer test • than that of imports, for if we sent away ■ 'produce to 'the value of millions, that !L amount of money must come into jthe “coib’nyV either ‘in cash or equivalent|exrchange of necessaries ; . and.' the total ; iW.Tldae' thus due to, us, and ; ooroing ia

course of settlement, is very little below the value of the same period last year. The real falling-off is in the reduced importation of general merchandise. The warehouses at Wellington, Auckland, Christchurch, and Dunedin have had "to keep down stocks, because the goods on hand were not moving off at the old quick rate, and the the Home warehouses were not willing, in a time of panic, to ship goods on credit with their forme recklessness. The colony’s trade is manifestly in a sound condition. Our total income for what we grow and send away is nearly as much in value as it was before the depression became severeThat money is clue and must reach us in some shape. Once here, its natural course is to pass from hand to hand, promoting local trade, and leaving some profit in every hand which the money touches. +