GERMANY’S ECONOMIC PLIGHT.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 7, Issue 263, 11 August 1915, Page 8

GERMANY’S ECONOMIC PLIGHT.

A Hamburg merchant has given to a Copenhagen journalist a picture of life In Hamburg. He said :• 1 ‘ Economic life is ruined. All the- factories are-at a standstill. Magazine and shot mills are not working, and . all docks and quays are empty. We are ia need of everything.” The merchant was asked about the dearth of copper, and said; “If it were only copper we wore in need of, it would be all right. But we want aluminium, which wc are nowpaying 530 marks for, as against the usual price of 1(50 marks. We want; antimony, for which w-e afiS now paying 220 marks as against 45 marks. Nickel, which usually costs 13.5, now-. costs 020 marks, and wc are also in-.-nccd of nitrates,- petrol, wool, and,' above all, grain. If the war Masts- some time longer, I do not dare to think; about the future. We can hit England, bytorpedoing, and w'e can hit hard, v . bnt that, unfortunately, does not. fill our stores. But w T e have sufficient . for three or four months, and we hope that that will be enough time for bringing Anal’ victory to our arms and breaking the iron ring which is squeezing us."