PACIFIC ISLANDS

Southland Times, Issue 18852, 18 June 1920, Page 5

PACIFIC ISLANDS

POSSIBILITIES OF TRADE. NEW ZEALAND NOT DOING ENOUGH. (Per United Press Association.) WELLINGTON, June 17. “Wc are not doing enough at our own doors,” remarked the Prime Minister to-day at the luncheon tendered by the New Zealand Association of British Manufacturers end x\gents to Mr R. W. Dalton, H.M. Trade Commissioner for the Dominion. Mr Massey was referring to the necessity for developing British trade, and he said that we in New Zealand were neglecting to a great extent the possibilities of trade expansion that lay in the smidl Islands in the Pacific. The opening of the Panama Canal would mean that' the islands would he of the very greatest importance in the near future. He instanced Fiji, which was part, of the Empire, and governed by our fellowcitizens. The population of those islands was at least 150,000, including some thousands of Anglo-Saxons. Steamers trading to British Columbia stopped at Fiji, and he would like to see some arrangement whereby vessels trading via the Panama Canal would also rail in at Fiji, both coming and going. If people looked into the matter they would see that New Zealand was not getting a fair share of the Pacific trade, taking the dominion’s position into account. The population and production of the Islands were growing, and New Zealand would have to look forward to doing more in the way of trade with those islands. The report of the commission which had been investigating the possibilities of trade with the islands, although not yet ready for publication, was very ini erecting, and suggested very great possibilities.