Before examining the effect of their decision it would be well to clear the air of one or two prevalent misconceptions, It is too readily forgotten that the Committee is a body representative of both growers and users and while its principal object is to secure an economic price for planters it has also the duty to hold the balance fairly for the other side. The most effective way in which this can be done is to regulate production with a view to maintaining world stocks as closely as possible to the technical needs of the market, The control on prices is thus indirect and guidance in coming to decisions is sought not so much in the course of prices, which are exposed to many transitory and extraneous disturbances (not to mention deliberate manipulation), but in the apparent trend of consumption and stocks which is hardly mistakeable. It is evident that sound judgment of the latter and appropriate regulation must inevitably lead to a fair price, That the Committee have not entirely succeeded in their aim must be put down to the deplorable condition of the industry when they were called into being and the disturbed condition of world trade, especially in the last twelvemonth, It must further be borne in mind that the Law of Diminishing Returns is applicable to other matters as well as taxation and that there is a limit to restriction which, if exceeded, will ensure high prices but concomitant ruin to most of the estates; a consideration perhaps not fully appreed by the advocates of drastic restriction average, or more realistically, 8% months' supply on the current rate of absorption, a rather dismal picture
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.