The scarcity of paper in Spain has caused some anxiety, and representatives of Spanish publishers, printers, and manufacturers of paper and cardboard have informed the Government of their willingness to postpone filling export orders until after the domestic demand for their products has been fully met. They also expressed a desire that the Government fix prices and conditions to control the export of raw materials used in paper manufacture. Accordingly, a royal order, published June 15, 1916, appointed a commission, a representative of the Government presiding, formed of three delegates chosen from each interested group, namely, paper manufacturers, newspaper publishers, and those engaged in bookmaking arts.
This commission is to pass on all complaints formulated, proposing, if necessary, such methods as it judges opportune with respect to the export of paper and un-manufactured cardboard. The custom house authorities must submit to this commission a sample of every class of paper or cardboard exported, its origin, and the name of the exporter.
The paper-making interests in Spain employs chiefly wood-pulp, and its price has increased about 85 per cent since the war began. Imports of wood-pulp in 1913 amounted to 61,000 metric tons of 2,204.6 pounds each; in 1914 to 40,000 tons, and in 1915 to 50,000 tons. More than half of this supply comes from Sweden; other sources are Germany and Norway.
Wood-pulp and logs for making pulp coming from foreign countries were exempted from the transport tax in March last, and an export duty of 18 pesetas gold per 100 kilograms ($1.58 per 100 pounds) levied on endless paper weighing from 41 to 50 grams per square metre and containing mechanical pulp.
SUPPLY AND DEMAND LAW CONTROLS PAPER PRICES.
In his address before the New York Business Publishers’ Association, formerly the New York Trade Press Association, at the Advertising Club of New York on Oct. 2, Judge C. F. Moore, secretary of the Bureau of Statistics of the Book Paper Manufacturers’ Association, declared that there was a real paper famine in the United States, and that the law of supply and demand was solely responsible for the present high prices of book paper.
He went on to say that the people in the United States were enormously busy and that they were using more paper than ever before; that there was a more acute paper famine abroad than in America, that the mills in the United States were all working day and night six days a week, and that because of discouraging legislation passed by Congress in the past the paper manufacturers had not been keen on building new plants and installing new machinery when there was such a chance for keen competition from abroad. He asserted that there had been no agreement by paper makers to boost the price or to regulate it.