London, Jan. 28, The consensus of reaction here to tue proposals of M. Paul van Zeeland, former Belgian Premier, on means of stimulating world trade indicates that much protracted and patient preparation is necessary if any results whatsoever are to be achieved.
The British Government, it is understood, is prepared to play its part if other nations will join in exploring the feasibility of a formal international meeting.
However, the formidable nature of the difficulties have been brought out by typical newspaper comment, for example the impossibility of recon-oiling totalitarian internal economy with the international machinery of free trade. There is also the dificulty of ensuring that any new international credits shall not be used for armaments.
It is generally emphasized that the present problems cannot be solved in classical economic terms, but are fundamentally political, though, as the "Daily Telegraph" remarks, in exposing the dangers, M. van Zeeland may have evoked a will to avert them.
The *News-Chronicle" is at the opinion that if dictators are unwilling io play their part, democracies alone should follow out the plan of M. van Zeeland.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.