The Empire's Resources
The maximum prosperity for Great Britain depends on an expan- sion of trade with all countries throughout the world, including those whose currency is linked with the dollar. The second-best is that with which we should have to be content if American economic policy compelled us to out down severely all imports for which dollars were required in payment. While in the first case we should still wish for an expansion of trade within the Empire, in the second it would be indispensable. An article on another page by Colonel Penn shows the vast potential reservoir of food and raw materials that exists within the Empire, waiting only for sedulous scientific development. We could get meat from the East African Colonies, tobacco from South Africa, cotton from the Sudan, and canned fish derived from the waters between Africa and India. Undoubtedly in the past we have done far too little in capitalising and guiding the production of food and raw materials in countries within the Colonial Empire, and much more might and should be done in their interests and ours. It must not, of course, be assumed that we can treat Crown Colonies, any more than mandated territories, as protected reserves for the reception of British exports. We are pledged to pursue an economic policy for dependent countries which consults their interests first. And in many colonies the policy of the open door is imposed by treaty. But that still leaves room for many imaginative commercial arrangements beneficial both to the colonies and to ourselves.
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