Why Does Australia Not Buy

Pacific Sulphur?

Letter to the Editor I READ in a recent Sydney Morning Herald that Australia is importing from Italy sulphur worth £2,650,000.

I wonder why New Guinea does not send sulphur to Australia —we have huge supplies around Rabaul and at Talasea.

There is sulphur in many places along

the Pacific volcano belt, much closer to Australia than is Italy.

I am, etc.,

Old Planter.

Kavieng.

Editorial Note. —A matter of exchange, probably. If Australia buys £2,000,000 worth of Italian sulphur, Italy can buy £2,000,000 worth of Australian wool or wheat. The Pacific Islands, even if they sold so much sulphur, could not absorb the same proportion of Australian pro ducts. . . . Once, when internat onal ex change was free, the Pacific Islands, hav

ing sold goods to Australia, could pass the credit around, for the ultimate benefit of Australia. But to-day’s control of exchange, like all other interference with economic law, leads to all kinds of ano malies.