HUSBANDRY: Wheat for Coffee

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Partner Winans skillfully conducted the negotiations in Brazil, beginning several months ago. Secrecy was essential. Under the saucy nose of Empire Salesman Edward of Wales, under the noses of Argentines and Russians with mountains of wheat for sale or barter, secrecy was kept, the two partners and their friends communicating in code. At the last moment came a scare: the Russians, having traded wheat for Italian fruit, had the same idea. They would dump the coffee they received into the U. S. market instead of marketing it in an orderly way. U. S. coffee men who had been taken into the secret were worried, but the new Brazilian Government—wealthy conservatives led in this matter by Minister of Finance Jose Maria Whitacker—were true to their U. S. friends. The deal went through, and in it the participants thought they saw significance far beyond the benefits to the Brazilian coffee and U.S. wheat situations: 1) It strengthened the new Brazilian Government, perhaps saved that country's financial structure; 2) it thus saved U. S. investors who hold $401,424,000 of Brazilian bonds.

China Too? Earlier last week the Farm Board got a nibble at some 15,000.000 bu. or more of its wheat. The Nationalist Government of China inquired through diplomatic channels if the U. S. would consider negotiations whereby Nanking would buy on long-term credit some wheat to relieve Yangtze flood victims (see p. 18). In less than three days the Farm Board responded that it would be delighted to sell to China. Then it waited for the Nationalist Government to make a bid, discuss price and credit terms, show what it would use for money.