Canada: EXTERNAL AFFAIRS: Momentous Decision

Quite casually, Canada's big, able Trade Minister James Angus MacKinnon rose in the House of Commons to make an announcement of import to the whole world. The Government had decided, he said, to hold down the Canadian export price of wheat to $1.55 a bushel.

The decision was made in the face of a mouth-watering fact: because of world shortages Canada could probably get any price she wanted, within reason, for her wheat. Canada could at least get the going U.S. price of $1.70 a bushel ($1.90 in Canadian money), which would delight wheatgrowers in a bad crop year.

But, said Minister MacKinnon, Canada feels a moral obligation not to gouge her customers (chiefly Great Britain and the small nations of Europe) now, when they are starving. This was not only bigheartedness on Canada's part. In the long haul, said Jim MacKinnon, Canada would benefit by being generous. "Higher wheat prices [now] would encourage the importing countries in a hurried return to wheat production" of their own, to Canada's ultimate detriment. There was a domestic reason for the decision as well: it would hold the line against inflation.

For Farmers. To make the new policy palatable to Canada's wheat farmers, the Government accompanied it with a guarantee: there will be no 38¢ wheat as there was in the 19305; Government subsidies will give wheatgrowers a minimum of $1 a bushel for their wheat for at least the next five years.

For reasons of pride many Canadians liked the new policy. In the past the Dominion had too often followed the U.S. lead, acted like a shy girl clutching her big sister's hand. Now Canada was stepping out, boldly and independently, on her own. More important internationally was the fact that Canada, taking the lead in a field where she has logical leadership (before the war, one third of all the wheat in world trade was Canadian), was making her wheat industry a national responsibility.