272 WHEAT PRODUCTION IN NEW ZEALAND 
Dardanelles, for the price fell to 52s. per quarter, but 
when the attack failed it soon rose again, and in May, 
British wheat was selling at 68s. 6d. per quarter. 
The most important factor arose from the fact that 
there was a shortage in the world’s wheat supply at the 
harvest of 1914. In 1914 the wheat supply was only 
90 per cent. of the previous year’s supply. The total 
supply in 1913 was 4,241,528,000 bushels, while in 1914 
it was 3,914,000,000 bushels. This was due to the low 
yields in Europe and Canada, and the failure of the 
Australian crop. Added to this there was the destruction 
of supplies in the zone of conflict during the summer of 
1914. Immense quantities of grain and flour must have 
been destroyed in Poland, East Prussia, Galicia, Belgium, 
and France, in the ebb and flow of the fight on so lengthy 
a battle line. 
Fourthly, there is the psychological factor, always in 
operation in extraordinary circumstances, but never so 
great in the commercial world for many years. With 
so many strong Powers plunged into war at a moment’s 
notice there was no certainty for weeks as to what might 
happen in the commercial world, and this caused a 
general rush among belligerents to increase their supplies 
of wheat by importation. 
Now, all these factors operated to raise the price of 
New Zealand wheat, but two other forces were also in 
operation which accentuated the tendency of prices to 
rise. First there was the knowledge that the Australian 
crop was almost a total failure, and secondly, there was 
an unfortunate and apparently unavoidable mistake in 
the estimates given in the official publications of the 
area under wheat. This latter factor was the more 
important owing to the deceptive nature of the season 
which led to an underestimate of yield. When, there- 
fore, the official estimate was given at 4,630,000 bushels, 
and it was known that supplies would not be available 
