306 REPORT—1904. 
Holland enters values as declared by shippers for dutiable goods, but 
the official values on which the rest of her trade statistics are based come 
from a fixed list many years out of date,! and her trade statistics have not 
the connotation as those of other nations for this reason. 
In Russia the values of goods are declared and compared with trade 
price-lists under expert advice. 
The United Kingdom takes declared values, but in many cases the 
figures are adjusted as described below. 
The adjustment of values to values at crossing the land frontier must 
be arbitrary, and there may be uncertainty at what point goods coming 
by sea are valued. It is quite uncertain how goods not on the official 
list, or not capable of brief description, would be valued in Germany, 
France, &c. ; presumably some form of declared value must be used.? 
In the United States imports are entered at the vaiue ready for 
shipment declared to the American Consul at the place of exportation. 
The values entered are those given on the invoices before inspection or 
appraisement for customs purposes. Exports of home produce, &c., are 
entered at the market value at the time and place of shipment, re-exports 
at their import value. 
It should be noticed that official values of exports have no necessarily 
close connection with the values actually realised abroad and remitted for 
separate consignments. They assume too great a uniformity in value. 
Also, there must be great error in pricing goods according to their 
description in all those cases where the goods are not seen and examined. 
Thus, the values affixed according to the official list to goods which do not 
pay duty, seem in most cases to be liable to considerable error. 
C. Registration of Origin and Destination. 
The classification of imports and exports according to origin is in a 
state of hopeless confusion. It is sometimes held that goods should be 
credited to the country where they are paid for ; thus, eggs from Austria 
sent to England on an order made to Austria should be credited to Austria, 
and not to Germany, Holland, or Belgium, through which they pass, 
while Swiss wines ordered of a Paris wine merchant should be credited to 
Paris. The place for payment is in very many branches of trade not the 
country of origin, and this plan, if carried out, would show the balance of 
trade but not its channels. The country of origin is not easily definable. 
A cargo of rails ordered by an English merchant to be shipped at Antwerp 
and delivered in Yokohama, may be duly credited either to Belgium or 
England, according to definition ; but if raw cotton is shipped from U.S.A, 
1 The list in use is still in the main that framed in 1868, which was based on a 
still older list. 
2 The following semi-official communication throws interesting light on this 
point: ‘In general there is no special difficulty in fitting unusual imports into one 
or other of the headings specially provided in the accounts. When, in course of 
time, the article becomes important, a new heading is reserved for it. ‘hus motor- 
cycles were formerly grouped as “ other cycles” in the French accounts, and turbines 
as “ machines and parts thereof of wrought iron or other common metal” in the 
German accounts. These articles now have separate values allotted to them. 
As regards pictures, the French accounts provide that objets de collection shall be 
valued at their declared value, and pictures are apparently classed under this head. 
On the other hand, in the German accounts, all pictures are entered by weight and 
valued accordingly, viz. at 20 marks per kilogram in 1901 and 25 marks per kilogram 
in 1902 and 1903.’ 
