Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-07-20
LOOK OUT, NOT IN,
AND LEND A HAND


The Motto Of Doctor HaIe's Famous
Society a Good One for Ameri.
ean-Trade Expansionists
THE opening of a summer school in
l. Washington by the Pan American
Union yesterday for those interested
in foreign trade, especially with the
countries In this hemisphere, is likely
to result in a more intelligent under
standing among business men of the
conditions under which trade can be
expanded.
The manufacturer who knows any
thing about those conditions Is excep-
tional He has not found it necessary to
inform himself, for he has been able to
sell at home about all that ne can pro-
duce. \ few manufacturers have been
engaged in the export business, but that
has been merely to dispose of their
surplus Still fewer have manufac-
tured especially for the foreign market.
Many manufacturers who sent their
agents abroad were discouraged because
the agents were not able to do business.
The agents were typical American
drummers, who imagined they could do
business with men of different race
in the same manner that they did busi-
ness with men at home. They were
ignorant of racial psychology in the first
place, and they did not know the Gus
toms of the country in the second
place.
The reports Of the American consuls
abroad are full Of the records of such
failures and full of information on the
way to avoid them in the future. But
no serious attempt AS been made to
profit by the instruction contained in
these reports.
The purpose Of the summer school in
Washington. which is to last for thirty
days, is to interest business men in the
possibilities of foreign trade and to
point out how our trade can be made to
grow.
This trade has expanded marvelously
since the beginning of the present CEN
tury. but its expansion has been chiefly
in noncompetitiye products, among which
are included those products which are
not produced in other countries in
sufficient quantities to meet the world
demand.
Agricultural implements afford an
example Of the noncompetitive product.
The exports grew from Sj,00000O in
1893 to $40 ,000. 900 in 1913. Steel af-
fords an example of expansion in trade
in a product of which the world was
demanding all that-the mills could turn
out. In the twenty years between 1893
and 1913 its exports grew from $780,
OOO, 900 to $304 ,000,0U0
We have supplied food to the rest of
the world. In 1893 the exports of pre-
pared and unprepared foodstuffs
amounted to S400, 900 900, and the. ex-
ports Of manufactured and semimanu-
factured articles were only S170 0,O0O,-
600.
Twenty years later, in 1913, the ex-
ports of foodstuffs had grown to only
$40 900 900. IN increase of S10,-
900, 900, while the exports of manu-
factured and semimanufactured articles
had increased to 81, ,1S4, 900, 900.
That is, in twenty years the exports
of American factories had increased 700
per cent.
The more recent figures will show a
still greater expansion, but they are af-
fected by the abnormal conditions of the
war and it is not fair to use them in a
comparison.
If the war had not intervened 1t would
have been necessary to give serious at
tention to n foreign trade policy long
before now. Mckinley saw that condi-
ton approaching when he said in his
last speech that we must reconsider our
old policies in the light of changed con-
ditions. The figures for 1913 show how
correctly he diagnosed the tendencies of
American trade.
The revolutionary changes that the
war has brought about in the financial
relations of the various nations, the
United States among them, force
much more radical reconsideration of
our trade policies than Mckinley had
in mind.
The first effect of these changes is
seen in the beginning of study of
trade with the South American coun-
tries in the summer school in Washing
ton. The war compelled these coun
tries to buy in the United States things
which they had been buying in Europe.
We cannot keep that market when
the European nations are again in con-
dition to compete with us unless we
become as skilful in our dealings with
the South Americans as the Europeans
were.
South American trade experts must
be developed, and then they must be
by the exporters. But they |
will not be employed, even if they shall
be produced. unless the exporters are
convinced Of their usefulness.
1t has taken years to persuade manu-
facturers that it pays them to hire
trained chemists and physicists in their |
plants. A few such men have been |
employed in the past, but their value |
has been underestimated.
What these trained men did during
the war in showing what could be done
in a score of different industries has
convinced men who were skeptical be-
fore that the trained specialist is worth
much more to him than any other man
in his plant.
The head of one great industry said |
a few months ago that he needed 200 |
chemists but could not get them. The
colleges are not turning them out fast
enough to meet the demand.
When the exporters seriously turn