The Daily News. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1916. A WORLD PROBLEM.

Taranaki Daily News, 27 November 1916, Page 4

The Daily News. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1916. A WORLD PROBLEM.

According to the President of the British Board of Trade (Mr, Runciman) the question of food supplies and prices has become a world problem. There are ample facts available to endorse that statement, which may be accepted as beyond question. The acuteness of" the shortage of supplies and the inflation of prices is not the same throughout the world, for it varies according to special conditions existing in different countries. At the present time an unhealthy competition for food supplies exists. The war has made this inevitable, and the producers are reaping a golden harvest, while the poor and struggling millions in the densely populated cities of the world find it increasingly difficult to obtain the absolute necessaries of life. Take the case of Britain, dependent on over seas supplies of wheat, ilour, meat, hitter, cheese and other foodstuffs, the masses are bound to suffer heavily in consequence of the prices of food being practically beyond their reach. The British Government has not been neglectful of this vital matter. At the beginning of the war the Government too! immediate control of the entire suga supplies o£ the nation. Later on, tin whole of the output of frozen men' available for export from New Zealam". Qrctnsland, Victoria, New South ale and South Australia was purchased, nr in 1915 arrangements made for 11 • taining the supplies #1 wheat country, part of that transact!! the acquisition of wheat jfr: -

ancl its sale cf Government agents in Britain, thus bridging over the gap until the new American crop wa» ready. The first and greatest claim on Ihcw supplies is that uf providing the mil liens (if men under arms with food. This of itself is an undertaking the enormous extent, of which can hardly be realised except by those actually engaged in commissariat work. It is this great drain 011 the world's food supplies that has caused the intense competition and forced prices up/ abnormally, It must be remembered that the Allies' armies a;re larger than ever, and that 110 one can tell how much longer the war may last. Bearing these facts in mind, it will be apparent to the meanest intelligence that the longer the struggle lasts the more acute will become tile problem of controlling prices of foodstuffs, also that of supplies. Government control of market values is only effective when the produce itself is also under Government control, h'jnc-e the impossibility oi ''holding-up" the law of supply and demand. In Germany the power of control over produce and prices is absolute, but Germany is not quite self-contained. As a consequence there is a considerable shortage of foodstuffs, and prices have risen over 117 per cent., notwithstanding' the elaborate system of restriction in vogue there, while in Austria they have risen 14!) per cent., as against only Go per cent, in Britain. Another aspect of the question that will .force itself into notice as a factor of no mean proportions in further affecting production is the increasing scarcity of labor owing to the drain on the man-power of the world for fighting purposes. America almost stands alone in escaping this human toll, and she has heaped up so milch wealth that it is a clog in the working of her economical machinery. We can all now see clearly that the proper course for the Imperial Government to have adopted on the outbreak of. war would have been to have arranged with India and the dominions for the first call on their produce at prices ruling immediately precedent to the war. That was not done, and the omission has been a costly penalty for neglect, for which not only the people of the United Kingdom are suffering, hut those, in New Zealand and other places as well. Mr. Runciman uttered a truism when 110 asserted that Government interference could not bring miraculous relief. There .'an be 110 effective remedy provided, and all wo can hope fbr is the institution of palliative measures. By the exercise )f care and selfdenial, and the enforced activity of noncombatants, the food supplies of the Empire may be largely increased. There should be systematic abstinence and universal co-operation in the vital work of food supplies. By the avoidance of waste and lessening the quantity of food consumed by each citizen, there will be a lessening of the demand, and with everyone engaged on useful work many more men of fighting age can be released for the Army. ! The time has arrived when all must work if the war is to be won and its after-effects mitigated. Where the Government should and must interfere is to prevent exploitation and the forcing up of prices without sufficient cause, but merely to satisfy inordinate greed. Let there be the most intense production, a commendable self-saerifice, and an adequate appreciation of the gravity of the food question, and then we may expect that the problem will be attacked with the same determination as that of responding to the call of duty.