io6 4 THE LATIN-AMERICAN REPUBLICS 



the field, purchasing several of the more important establishments, while they have con- 

 structed others near British factories, the better to compete with them. 



The Belgians, again, have encroached to a very great extent upon the British 

 galvanised wire and coal (briquette) trade; and other countries have entered with greater 

 freedom the Latin-American markets, where a couple of decades ago they were hardly 

 to be found at all. Japan, for instance, has now a valuable Latin- American connection; 

 her enterprising people have a line of steamships running regularly to the principal 

 South American ports, while the formal opening of the Panama Canal, in 1915, will 

 witness a new service of trading steamers also flying the Japanese flag. The inter- 

 state trade between the various Latin-American Republics has likewise increased to a 

 considerable extent, and this fact, combined with the establishment (especially in 

 Mexico and Argentina) of a number of well-equipped factories to use the native-grown 

 raw material, has further reduced British imports into those countries. 



The total foreign trade of Latin-America (export and import) may be conservatively 

 estimated at an annual value of 435,000,000. The increase during the past decade 

 has not been less than 260,000,000. While Great Britain retains the lead 

 Foreign - n re g ar( j O exports to these countries, both the United States and Germany 



are fast challenging this superiority. The different Republics of South and 

 Central America in 1910-11 were customers of Great Britain to the amount of 26.03 

 percent of the whole of their imports; the United States supplied 23.31 percent, and 

 Germany 15.45 per cent. Trading figures show that the Latin-American States are the 

 largest homogeneous unit in British foreign trade. For the year mentioned, these coun- 

 tries took British goods to the value of 53,000,000, the greater part being manufactured 

 articles. The imports from the United States in 1910-11 were valued at $240,663,222. 



In imports from Latin-America, the United States leads with 34.51 per cent, followed 

 by Great Britain with 20.99 P er cent, Germany with 11.41 per cent, and France with 

 8.29 per cent, and the opening of the Panama Canal is bound to give a further stimulus 

 to North American activity. The total foreign trade of the twenty Latin-American 

 Republics, with their population of 70,000,000, for the year 1910-11, exceeded 508,- 

 744,806. Of this total the South American countries (exclusive of Mexico, Central 

 America, Cuba, Haiti and Santo Domingo) were responsible for 468,744,806, or an 

 increase over the preceding year of nearly 40,000,000. 



During the last fourteen years the foreign trade of Latin- America has grown by 157.4 

 per cent; taking the States of Mexico and the six Central American Republics apart, we 

 find that the ratio of increase has amounted to 189 per cent in the first, and to 148.6 per 

 cent in the second case. The purchasing power of the Latin-Republics has, therefore, 

 increased at the rate of between n and 12 per cent per annum. 



While Great Britain enjoys fully one-third of the entire trade of these countries, her 

 share might well be expected to be substantially greater, since it is mainly with British 

 capital that these South and Central-American States have been opened up, 

 Relative their railways constructed, and their waterworks, telephones, docks and har- 

 British trade, bours completed; it is principally with the aid of British capital that their 

 banks and insurance institutions have been brought into being. Moreover, 

 the reinvestments from Great Britain in Latin-American enterprises amount to over 

 42,000,000 per annum; taking an average for the last three years, one-quarter of the 

 whole amount of foreign capital finding its way into the South and Central-American 

 countries has been of British origin. The sum of such capital invested to date is es- 

 timated at 685,000,000 sterling. 



For some years past, nevertheless, British trade has by comparison been steadily 

 falling off, while that of the United States has been gaining headway. At the same time 

 Great Britain is more and more dependent upon the products of these countries, more 

 especially of the Argentine Republic, for supplies of wheat and meat, looking to them as 

 the legitimate market for her manufactured goods. The proportions of British trade of 

 late with these countries have increased, it is true; for while in 1900 Latin-America took 

 one-eighth of British exported products, by 1905 the total had reached the proportion 



