Islands
p. 68 · Read in the full issue
Japan In The
Japan has prospered in trade with the Islands in recent years and the country’s gains have mostly been at the expense of the Island’s biggest shipper, trader and exporter for over 100 years—Australia.
No one has yet done a run down of Japanese influence in the Islands, but last year’s closure of New Hebrides manganese mines merely be cause Japanese buyers offered uneconomical prices is an in dication of Japan’s growing business power in the Islands.
In New Guinea, Japan has big timber and trading interests.
She sells more vehicles there than Australia, and looks to be a major buyer of Bougainville’s copper.
In Fiji she buys copper, bauxite and timber and does a roaring trade with duty-free goods.
In the Solomons she’s a big trader and in the New Hebrides and American Samoa she has fishing interests. Japan is trading to the Gilbert and Ellice Islands, buying phosphate from Nauru and getting into West Samoan timber. And so the story goes.