F 406
British Finance and Cormorce.
By Robert Mackay.
Export Trade and Industrial Output.
80
The June trade returns show an expansion in British exports, the value in that month being eight per cent higher than in June, 1938. For the first six months of the year British export values
were £256 millions, compared with 2255 millions in the first half
of 1938. Import values for the same period were respectively
BA47,900,000 and 469,700,000; compared with a year ago, the visible adverse balance of trade has improved by nearly ten per cent. Along the principal items of British export exapnsion are coal, aircraft, non-ferrous metals, woollens and other textiles. As regards British industries, the dominant note is one of
steady development. In the textile centres, for instance, the extent of the improvement in the woollen industry may be gauged from the fact that whereas in June, 1938, there were 23,144 persons unemployed, the number out of work in June, 1959, was only 7,903. The cotton trade, too, has experienced a further improvement, the number of unemployed in the trade having fallen by nearly 5,COO between May and June. In another: ajor British industry, steel, production was well maintained in June, after a record month in lay. This is the season for plant stoppages for overhaul and repairs, so that total output is liable to decline, but the daily rate of production in June was nearly 500 tons higher than in the preceding month, and very much higher than in June last year. the June total was only 776,100 tons in 1958, but this year the
June output was no less than 1,175,600 tons.
Thus
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