136 AUSTRALIA'S FLUCTUATING ADVANTAGE IN 
seas trade for Australia than timber. Owing, also, to the 
peculiar circumstance that Australian timber is almost wholly 
hardwood, it enters comparatively little into foreign trade, 
whereas softwood, especially from Europe and the Pacific coast 
PORTE 
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——————————o————————————— 
1901 1903 1905 7907 - 1909 1911 1913 
Fig. XII. SECTIONAL PRICE-LEVELS:—IMPORTS, EXPORTS, 
AND DOMESTIC COMMODITIES 
Smoothed 3-uear moving-averaqe curves shown heavy. 
of North America, was during the period under review, and still 
is, an important item in the commodity balance. In 1908, a 
typical year, the ratio of the value of imported softwood to 
the value of exported hardwood was 5: 2; but, contrary to the 
general conclusion stated above, the price of hardwood—the 
mainly home-trade commodity—rose only 18 per cent. ; whilst 
the price of softwood, the wholly foreign-trade commodity, rose 
28 per cent.