Table 3.-Principal Commodities in Trade of the United States With Canada-Con.

1 Figures for 1929 and 1932 have not been adjusted for minor transfers in classifications of later years. Household refrigerators only.

No comparable data available.

4 Not shown separately.

Less than 500.

6 Ton of 2,240 pounds in1929 and 1932, ton of 2,000 pounds, air-dry weight, thereafter.

"Includes articles (the growth, produce, or manufacture of the United States) returned, and household and personal effects.

NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR

Foodstuffs, articles of clothing, and tobacco, taken together, comprised over half of United States exports to Newfoundland and Labrador in 1938, a larger proportion of the trade than in other recent years. The export values of these products were nearly as large as in 1937, and values for passenger automobiles and chemical products, among other commodities, varied only slightly from the 1937 figures. There were, however, decreases in exports of coal, sulphur, metal manufactures, and machinery in 1938. These decreases accounted for the 20-percent reduction in the value of total export trade with Newfoundland and Labrador (from $9,557,000 in 1937 to $7,671,000 in 1938).

Statistics of the principal commodity exports in 1938 were as follows: Meats, 10,726,000 pounds valued at $953,000 (8,715,000 pounds, $993,000 in 1937); wheat flour, 120,000 barrels at $617,000 (107,000 barrels, $689,000 in 1937); tobacco and tobacco manufactures, $290,000 ($316,000 in 1937); textiles and textile manufactures $1,092,000 ($1,063,000 in 1937); machinery and vehicles, $1,329,000 ($2,354,000 in 1937)-of which automobiles, including parts and accessories were $374,000 ($373,000 in 1937); metals and manufactures $559,000 ($1,017,000 in 1937); nonmetallic minerals, $415,000 ($630,000 in 1937); and chemicals and related products, $437,000 ($384,000 in 1937).

The value of total United States imports for consumption from this area decreased 16 percent from $6,561,000 in 1937, to $5,492,000 in 1938, mainly as a result of smaller shipments of newsprint. Paper represented approximately three-fifths of the 1938 total imports, but this was a somewhat smaller proportion than in other recent years. Imports of frozen blueberries declined also in 1938, but larger amounts of fish, cod oil and cod-liver oil, fresh berries, and metals were imported in 1938 than in 1937. Figures for these imports in 1938, with 1937 figures in parentheses, follow: Newsprint, 136,241,000 pounds valued at $3,193,000 (256,689,000 pounds, $4,314,000); fish, 31,894,000 pounds at $1,371,000 (27,482,000 pounds, $1,273,000); cod oil, 435,000 gallons at $125,000 (211,000 gallons, $90,000); codliver oil, 217,000 gallons at $126,000 (89,000 gallons at $52,000); frozen blueberries, 2,173,000 pounds at $129,000 (5,741,000 pounds, $396,000); and natural berries, 668,000 pounds at $32,900 (810,000 pounds, $37,727).

LATIN AMERICA

From the depression low point in 1932, United States exports to Latin American countries showed a relatively marked growth to 1937, in which year they represented 17.3 percent of our total export trade. When exports to Curacao and the other European colonies are included in the total for the area, the figure for 1937 is 19 percent, the largest proportion in recent years. A marked growth was also shown during the 1920's, but in the peak year of that period the goods sent to Latin America did not comprise so large a proportion of total United States exports as in 1937, although absolute values were higher. With the development of trade recession late in 1937 and 1938 and the decline in world prices, United States sales in Latin America, as in other areas, decreased considerably; they were, nevertheless, 18.2 percent of total United States exports in 1938, a proportion that has been exceeded only in 1920, 1929, and 1937. The total exports to Latin America aggregated $564,137,000 in 1938, as compared with $639,422,000 in 1937 and $972,900,000 in 1929.

Although many of the countries of Latin America experienced a period of declining prosperity during 1938, the imports of the area as a whole were well sustained. Exploration of new oil fields and expansion in petroleum production led to a high level of business activity and increased imports in Venezuela during 1938. In several other countries, the high prices of gold and silver influenced the production of those metals and indirectly the volume of business and of import trade. Although prices of the principal agricultural products of Latin America were lower in 1938 than in 1937 and although exchange controls operated in some countries against the purchase of United States goods, United States exports to Central and South America. continued in large volume throughout 1938. Certain developments in Mexico and Cuba, discussed elsewhere in this bulletin, caused a substantial reduction in United States exports to those countries.

The United States has been for many years the principal purchaser of Latin American products; moreover, our imports of these goods have consistently been larger in value over a long period of years than our exports to that region. The annual average import surplus in trade of the United States with Latin American countries during the 10 years from 1928 through 1937 amounted to more than $100,000,000. For various reasons, however, the value of imports of Latin American products dropped 31 percent in 1938 (as compared with 1937) to a total of $485,335,000, or to $78,800,000 less than the value of United States exports to the area. If, however, the trade in gold and silver, which represents the output of an important industry in a number of the Latin American countries, is included with the merchandise figures, imports were larger in value than exports, as in other recent years, but by a much reduced figure. The decline in the import total in 1938 was influenced mainly by the decrease in prices of tropical

foodstuffs and copper as compared with 1937 and by the marked reduction which occurred in imports of corn, hides, and wool from Argentina and of oil-bearing seeds and vegetable oils from Brazil. Because of the marked fluctuation in business activity in the United States and the marked changes which have occurred in domestic crop yields, import trade in these latter agricultural products has experienced wide variations in recent years. Latin America has furnished over the last 40 years about a fourth of the total imports of the United States. During the World War period, when prices were higher, the percentage was considerably above one-fourth, while in recent years it has been somewhat lower. In 1938, Latin American products were 24.8 percent of our total imports, whereas they were 22.9 percent of the total in 1937.

1901-1905 1906-1910 1911-1915 1916-1920 1921-1925 1926-1930 1931-1935 1936-1940
Figure 3.-Trade of the United States with Latin America.

In table 6 are shown the principal United States commodities which are exported to the 20 Latin American Republics. Among the items listed by groups in the table, machinery and vehicles comprise more than one-half the total exports to the 10 South American Republics and approximately two-fifths of total exports to the 20 Latin American countries. Machinery and automobiles make up a smaller proportion of exports to the 10 countries in Southern North America than to the countries in South America; foodstuffs and articles of clothing are a substantial portion of the trade with that area.

Table 7 shows the principal imports into the United States from Latin America. Coffee represented 45 percent of the total imports from South American Republics in 1938, while copper, petroleum, nitrates, hides and skins, wool, and canned beef, taken together, comprised 27 percent of the total. Sugar, the most important import into the United States from Latin North America, accounted for slightly more than two-fifths of the value of total imports from that area, while bananas, coffee, tobacco, sisal, and copper comprised about 33 percent of the total.

18

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Table 4.-Trade With Latin America, by Commercial Regions and by Countries

[Millions of dollars]

1 Includes trade with 20 Latin American Republics, the European colonies, and the Canal Zone, but does not include the shipments to and from Puerto Rico shown separately at bottom of table. Trade with Virgin Islands is included in 1929 and 1932; reported as a noncontiguous territory in recent years. (See pages 146 and 147.)

2 Less than $50,000.