The following table shows the amount and value of tropical products imported into the United States during the year ended June 30, 1913:—
| Products | Amount | Value |
| Cocoa | 140,039,172 lb. | $17,389,042 |
| Coffee | 863,130,757 lb. | 118,963,209 |
| Fibres | 407,098 T. | 49,075,659 |
| Manufactures of fibres | —— | 76,972,416 |
| Fruits and nuts | —— | 42,622,653 |
| Goatskins | 45,729,000 T. | 24,790,417 |
| Gums of various kinds | —— | 15,138,895 |
| Rubber | 214,000,000 lb. | 101,333,158 |
| Matting | —— | 1,651,813 |
| Vegetable oils | —— | 38,112,883 |
| Silk, unmanufactured | —— | 84,914,717 |
| Spices | 65,225,401 lb. | 6,187,136 |
| Sugar | 4,740,041,488 lb. | 103,639,823 |
| Tea | 94,812,800 lb. | 17,433,688 |
| Leaf tobacco | 67,454,745 lb. | 35,919,079 |
| Manufactured tobacco | —— | 6,577,403 |
| Cabinet woods | —— | 8,880,000 |
| Rattans and reeds | —— | 1,800,000 |
| $751,401,991 |
The balance of trade with the more important countries from which we get these products is heavily against us, as is shown by the following table in which I have included Switzerland, not because we get tropical or sub-tropical products from that country, but because it furnishes us embroideries, etc., which could be very cheaply produced in the Philippines. The figures are for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1913:—
| U. S. Imports from | U. S. Exports to | Balance against U. S. | |
| Brazil | $120,155,855 | $42,638,467 | $77,517,388 |
| Cuba | 126,088,173 | 70,581,154 | 55,507,019 |
| British E. I. | 116,178,182 | 15,108,956 | 101,069,226 |
| Japan | 91,633,240 | 57,741,815 | 33,891,425 |
| China | 39,010,800 | 21,326,834 | 17,683,966 |
| Switzerland | 23,260,180 | 826,549 | 22,433,631 |
| Mexico | 77,543,842 | 54,571,584 | 22,972,258 |
| Colombia | 15,992,321 | 7,397,696 | 8,594,625 |
| Venezuela | 10,852,331 | 5,737,118 | 5,115,213 |
| Egypt | 19,907,828 | 1,660,833 | 18,246,995 |
| $640,622,752 | $277,591,006 | $363,031,746 |
There is no such relationship with the Philippines, which during 1912 imported $20,770,536 worth of merchandise from the United States to offset the $21,619,686 worth shipped to that country.
The Philippines could readily produce all of these products in quantities sufficient to meet the demands of the United States if there were proper development of the resources of the islands, which have rich land, good labour and suitable climate, but lack capital and competent, skilled supervision.
The situation has been admirably summed up in the following statement issued some time since by the Manila Merchants’ Association:—
“The Philippines will consume of imported commodities what they are able to pay for. Their purchasing capacity will always be measured by their production of export commodities. There is nothing that they produce, or are adapted to produce, that the United States is not at present under the necessity of buying from foreign countries whose import trade it does not, and never will, control. Thus it cannot hope for such advantages in other fields yielding tropical products as it already possesses in these Islands.”
The Philippines should furnish the bulk of the tropical products imported into the United States. The commerce between the two countries should in the very near future increase to $100,000,000 per year each way and should go on increasing more and more rapidly thereafter.