INDUSTRY AND TRADE
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The Statistical Office of the Commerce and Industry Department continued to publish monthly statistics of the quantity and value of goods imported or exported. Figures for trade statistics are collected from the declarations which importers and exporters are required by law to file with the Statistical Office.
As from January, a more detailed breakdown of exports by countries was brought into effect, and a still more detailed, but unpublished, breakdown can be obtained on request. Towards the end of the year, an experimental method of acquiring figures of the quantity and value of goods received or despatched by post was tried out; there is no statutory requirement to supply these figures.
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TRADE CONTROL
Import controls were eased considerably during the year. In April Argentine, Iran and Japan were placed on the open general import licence and non-strategic goods may now be freely imported from these territories without special licences. Import controls over items of low strategic sig- nificance were also relaxed, and quantitative and end-use controls are now maintained only in respect of highly strategic commodities.
Export controls were relaxed in June to permit a number of previously embargoed items of low strategic value to be exported to Mainland China and North Vietnam.
The rescission in August of the Exportation (Prohibition) (North Korea) Order, 1950, brought control over the export of goods to North Korea into line with the control exercised on exports to Mainland China.
THE PREVENTIVE SERVICE
The enforcement of trade controls, and the inspection of factories and goods in connexion with the export of Hong Kong products under certificates of origin and Imperial Preference certificates are among the duties of the Preventive