Directory_and_Chronicle_1932 — Page 433

CHINA

381

1929. The British Empire slightly improved her position and claimed 24.5 per cent. of the import trade, as against 21.6 per cent. in the preceding year. Considerable comment has appeared in the Press as to the decline of China's import trade with America, and, although this cannot be borne out by Custoins statistics as recorded in Haikwan taels, a considerable shrinkage has to be noted, in common with other countries, when these figures are converted into gold, which is the true criterion in the case of imports. In view of the world- wide trade depression the various decreases in the value of the import trade from each of the principal countries trading with China calculated in gold may be of interest and are as follows: British Empire (excluding Hongkong), 16 per cent; Japan (including Formosa), 28 per cent.; United States of America (including Hawaii), 28 per cent. An analysis of the figure for the British Empire however portrays some striking features. Great Britain's trade decreased by 36 per cent. and that of Canada by 75 per cent., while British India registered an increase of 74 per cent., the value of her import trade being approximately £12,500,000, exceeding that of Great Britain herself by over £2,300,000. These somewhat amazing figures are still more noticeable when one glances at the Haikwan tael equivalents, and India's share in the import trade of China-Hongkong excluded-has jumped from 5 to 12 per cent., a somewhat significant increase, though possibly transitory only. Export figures reveal no striking changes in the direction of trade, America gaining a fractionally larger share at the expense of Japan. Germany continued to improve her statistical position both as a seller and as a customer of China, the only other countries falling into the same category, but to a lesser degree, being Sweden, Denmark, the Belgo-Luxemburg Economic Federation, and Aus- tralasia. Of other countries not already mentioned, France and, still more, Italy were sufferers from the general economic trade depression, while the Netherlands and Russia once again proved themselves excellent customers rather than sellers, and the charges levelled against the latter country of dumping cheap goods on an overstocked market at China's expense, although possibly true to a limited extent in the case of certain commodities, cannot be endorsed generally by trade statistics.

IMPORTS.

As already noted, the value of net imports, i.e., gross imports less re-ex- ports abroad of foreign produce to foreign countries, exceeded that of the preceding year by approximately 44 million Haikwan taels and sets a new high level in the value of the import trade when estimated in silver. Inflated values, however, contingent on the rise of sterling exchange rather than an increase in the volume of trade, are responsible for this result. In the case of raw materials, however, the fall in the gold price on the world's markets to a large extent offset the fall in exchange, but the total value of imports- 1,310 million Haikwan taels,-when converted into pounds sterling at the average rates of exchange ruling throughout the year, represents an equivalent of approximately £124,000,000, a figure which is some £44,000,000 less than in the preceding year and over £50,000,000 less when compared with the figures for 1928. It is interesting to note the marked decline in the imports of manufactured cotton goods and the huge increase in raw materials and foodstuffs, which might tend to give

to give the impression that China is becoming an industrial rather than an agricultural nation. It is to be hoped, however, that this tendency is in part, at any rate, illusory or transi- tory only, for, while it is in the best interests of China that she should make herself as far as possible independent of foreign nations where manufactures are concerned and at the same time absorb that vast volume of man-power which at present remains unproductive or unemployed, it would be not only to her own detriment but to that of the world in general were she to relin- quish the cultivation of those vast fertile tracts of land, with which she has been endowed by nature, for the doubtful blessings of industrialism. The following table shows in Haikwan taels the value for the last three years of