Tlie Indian Wheat Trade, 
57 
they were four " lean years" for Europe as a whole, and, as long 
as they lasted, the heavy imports, even including those from 
India, failed to bring down the average price below 4:1s. 7d. a 
quarter ; but, in the last four years of generally good or fair 
wheat crops, the supplies, although diminished, have been re- 
latively too great. If the Indian supply to Europe of about 
17,000,000 quarters during the period had not been forthcoming, 
I believe that the price would have kept above 40s. a quarter. 
How is it that India has been able to increase her exports 
of wheat in the face of declining prices, which have reduced 
the acreage and production of wheat in so great a wheat-grow- 
ing country as the United States ? The answer is very simple. 
It is that the price of wheat in India has not been reduced at 
all. Upon that point there is no room for doubt, however 
much difference of opinion may be called forth in accounting 
for the fact. Official prices taken from local markets, which 
best indicate the prices received by growers, will hereafter be 
referred to ; but first it is desirable to show the fluctuations 
of the prices of a particular standard variety of wheat at a 
particular place. In the official returns issued by the Indian 
Government, there are lists of prices at Calcutta and Bombay 
for certain years, but not for the last two ; and as I have been 
favoured by a large shipping firm with a fortnightly list of the 
prices of No. 2 Club wheat at Calcutta for the ten years ending 
with 1885, and for the first half of 1886, and have elsewhere 
obtained more recent prices, it appears preferable to use these 
records, which, as they were obtained for commercial purposes, 
are more likely to be accurate than the official returns. I give 
below the range of prices per maund of 82 lbs. (82^ lbs. 
exactly, but commercially reckoned at 82 lbs. — and conveniently 
so, as there are exactly G maunds of 82 lbs. in a quarter of 
492 lbs., the weight at which Indian cargoes are sold in 
London) : — 
Range op Prices for No. 2 Club Wheat at Calcutta. 
Year 
a. 
p- 
7^^. V. 
p- 
1876 
. . 2 
3 
0 
to 
2 14 
0 
1877 
'. 2 
8 
0 
>> 
It 
3 11 
0 
1878 
. 3 
4 
0 
3 12 
0 
1879 
. 3 
C 
0 
)) 
» 
3 13 
0 
1880 
. 2 
9 
0 
3 7 
0 
1881 
2 
8 
0 
2 14 
0 
1882 
'. 2 
11 
0 
» 
3 1 
0 
1883 
2 
13 
0 
2 14 
0 
1884 
'. 2 
3 
0 
2 9 
G 
1885 
. 2 
3 
0 
2 10 
0 
1880 (half year) . 
2 
7 
0 
2 9 
G 
1887 
2 
8 
0 
2 12 
0 
J888 (Feb.) , 
• f 
10 
0 
p 12 
0 
