SHIPPING AND THE WAR 



Now that the New Year has fairly started, it is possible to look round the world of 

 shipping and consider not only the trend of business in the yey that has passed, but also 

 prospects for the future. The history of shipping has never seen anything to approach 

 the increases in freights of the past six months. The primary cause has been the needs 

 of the Admiralty, in fulfilment of which they have freely requisitioned British tonnage. 

 The result has been a chronic shortage of the means of transport in every market in the 

 world. The keen competition among foreign shippers has forced upon the shipowner 

 the embarrassing choice of freights which soared ever upwards against his own volition. 

 A careful study of all the prospects cannot but reveal the absolute assurance that there is 

 nothing, which can be humanly foreseen, to depress freight markets for a very consider- 

 able time to come; on the contrary, everything points to continued rises in every direction 

 unless maximum rates of freight are fixed to Allied countries by Governmental interven- 

 tion. — London Morning Post. 



THE OCEAN FREIGHT QUESTION 

 As Viewed by the English Miller 



The most serious feature of the corn (wheat) trade at the present moment is the 

 enormous freight rates that have to be paid for the carriage of grain to this country. 

 In normal times the cost of carrying a bushel of wheat from New York to a British 

 port was about 2d. (4 cents); often it was a little less. Now it is Is. 8d. (40 cents), an 

 increase of 12s. ($2.88) a quarter (8 bushels). 



North America has harvested the largest crop in the history of that continent. Not 

 only is it the largest, but very much the largest ever grown there. The United States 

 has reaped a crop of over a billion bushels, 112 million bushels more than her previous 

 best. Canada has a still greater relative increase, her harvest having yielded 336 million 

 bushels, 100 million bushels, or nearly 50 per cent., more than the previous record of the 

 Dominion, and yet, thanks to the shipowners, we in England, are paying much more for 

 wheat to-day than we were a year ago, although the commodity is much cheaper now 

 both in Chicago and Winnipeg. A year ago October wheat was selling in Winnipeg at 

 115 cents a bushel. At the moment of writing it is just under a dollar, or 15 cents a 

 bushel, i.e., 5s. a quarter cheaper than at the same date in 1914. On the other hand, a 

 year ago, 12 weeks after the outbreak of war, No. 1 Northern Manitoba October shipment 

 was sold in London at 44s. 6d. per 480 lbs., c.i.f. (cost, insurance, freight), the ocean rate 

 being 3%d. To-day the same grade of wheat in the same position is selling at 54s. per 

 qr., c.i.f. True the rate of exchange is against this country to about the extent of the 

 equivalent of Is. 6d. per qr. of wheat at the present price of the cereal. We will deduct 

 that sum from the present c.i.f. value of the grain, and call it 52s. 6d. The c.i.f. cost of 

 No. 1 Northern Manitoba is then 8s. a qr. dearer here than a year ago. Adding to the 

 8s. the 5s. lower cost of the grain in Winnipeg, we have 13s., which is about the actual 

 amount transport charges are costing us more than this time last year. 



That this is a serious extra charge we think no one will deny. The British Govern- 

 ment are carrying the war risk insurance at almost a nominal rate, call it 6d. a qr., and 

 then reckoning 70 per cent, of flour from the wheat and 92 4-lb. loaves to the sack of 

 flour, we find that the extra profits — war profits — that the shipowners are making is 

 imposing a bread tax on the British public of lj^d. per 4-lb. loaf. These are figures 

 that can be verified by the "man in the street." We do not ask any layman to take our 

 figures. If he chooses to obtain a year-old London daily and compare American and 

 Canadian market prices of wheat and Baltic sales then with those now current, he can 

 soon verify them for himself, as can also his Britannic Majesty's Government. What 

 the shipping companies' increased working costs are we cannot tell exactly, but suppose 

 we allow them the odd one-third of a penny a loaf for increased working expenses, that 

 would mean a full 4d. a bushel more, and we doubt if working expenses have increased 



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