Proposed Grant to China Silver at of 590,000,000 Ounces of Low Rate Mr. Taane Ezra, by unanimous Yote appointed advisor to the International Silver Commission, whose chairman is the Hon. Frank J. Cannon, late United States Senator from Utah, has arrived in Shanghai to confer with leading bankers and Dusinessmen regarding the Commission's plan to provide China with a large rehabilitation silver loan in the form of bullion by weight.
Tu an interview with a representative of the "North-China Daily News" Mr. Ezra emphasized! that such "a loan would be conditional upon the consent of all other interested countries, It was not likely, he said, that any opp tion would be met with if Chin herself was prepared to accept the Joan and its attached conveniences.
"The proposed loan,-as suggested Jest March by the Commission's chairman, the Hon, Frank J. Cannon, constitutes a remedy for China' present. troubles which would not' Involve the questions of money which discussed, "In usually arise often silver values axe
other words, question of ratio, The plan, in brief, 4s, to loan the Chinese Government a large amount of silver as a commodity, probably up to 600,000,000 ounces, to be repaid in ounces of silver over a long period—say 40 or 50 years—at a low rate of interest, The silver 80 loaned would be coined here and expended for useful and economic purposes under the diveetion of a faint commission consisting of perhaps seven Chinese and seven foreign representatives of the countries party to the loan. In addition, there would be a chairman with an international reputation.
The result of a loan of this kind would be that immediate relief would be given to the suffering in this country. The people would thereby provided with enhanced means of Hihood. Another development.
Fold be nat there would be an immediate vise in the price of silver in the world markets, thereby increasing China's ability to buy from gold using countries. The question is undoubtedly one of international Smportance and not one which con-subject of the communist menace and its relation to conditions in this country, Mr. Exra said that communism threatened not only China but every other country of importance. It was in fact a world peril. If the people of China were provided with the means of earning consistently decoxt livelihood that peril as far as they were concerned would disappear. Since the proposed loin would ensure the hap-Piness of many millions of workers its importance from the additional standpoint of world peace and understanding could not be decried. Such perils always arose in times of economic stress; measures to cope with the stress inevitably resulted in proportionate mitigation of the peril. In this connection, an appealing point about the proposed loan no money would change Ive only the supply of a commodity returnable in a set number of years. China could not but benefit as the result.
"As regards the possible reaction of such a loan on' world finance," continued Mr. Ezra, "some facts an'! figures may prove of interest. The ratio of production of silver to gold has been quite uniform. From the year 1493 until 1923 there was a Production, for example, of 13,215,- 290,481. ounces of silver and '024,- 599,182 ounces of gold, a ratio of Jess than 81 ounces of silver to each ounce of yuld. Tt is estimated that of these amounts there still remain lable for money purposes about '7,000,000,000 ounces of silver and about 600,000,000 ounces of gold. Consequently, if all the available silver and gold were' coined at present United States ratio, that is, gol ut $20.67 an ounce and silver 1.2929 an ounce, there would be jollers in silver than gold. This fs that there never has been any:
of silver from production. The depreciated price of silver has-come yearly world production of silver is /about 255,000,000 ounces, of which the United States produces about 60,000,000, Canada about 20,000,000, Jand Mexico about 100,000,000. North Jand South America, therefore, produce about 85 per cent. of the world's supply. The present yearly production of gold is about 20,000,- 000 ounces, about half of which is [produced in 8. Africa."
The International Silver Commission, of which Mr. Ezra is advisor, ized consists of the following member Hon. Frank J. Cannon (chairman), W. Mont Ferry, Frank B. Cook, G. W. Syder, and Caroline Evans." It }was formed under instructions from voluntary group of industrial leaders, financiers, and economists present at Washington the need of the world for restoration of silver to its old historic place if humet was to be preserved from the miscrfes entailed by the appalling loss in purchasing power in the Orient. A further motive was the premise that the people of the world cannot exist with one half prosperous and one half on the verge of starvation and that there is no such thing as overproduction when one half of the people of the world are in need.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.