20 Soviet Dumping
Down, feathers, bacon, linen textiles, carpets, vegetable
oils, pitch and tar, all were poured into the country in large
quantities realising a total figure of £17,422,000. Furs alone
fetched £21,198,000, a remarkably high figure in view of the
absurd prices quoted. Oil products fetched more than
£26,000,000. And, lastly, as if to add insult to injury,
there is a total of £2,000,000, representing the sale of
Russian chemicals. Yet Russia has always been a buyer of
chemicals.
The latest figures available for the imports to Great
Britain from Soviet Russia show the declared value between
January 1st and December 31st, 1930, as £34,245,419. But
declared values alone do not illustrate the extent of dumping
 ; they should be compared with the quantities of goods
imported.
Detailed statistics for 1930 either from Moscow or London
are not yet available but in replies given in the House of
Commons on the subject of Anglo-Soviet trade it was stated
that wheat imported from Soviet Russia between January
1st and December 31st, totalled 18,853,000 cwt. Considerable
 increases in the imports of timber, oil, matches, textiles,
 bacon, poultry and game and a large variety of foodstuffs
 and manufactures will also be seen as soon as the
detailed figures are issued.
An examination of prices during the period under review
shows that every one of the Soviet commodities were sold at
levels fluctuating from between 5 per cent. and 25 per cent.
below all other prices. At the same time, the indices of
wholesale and retail prices in Soviet Russia, published by
the Central Statistical Bureau, show that the price level in
Russia itself was fluctuating between 84 and 112 per cent.
above the level of world prices. In fact, during the whole
period, pages of the official Soviet Press were concerned with
the sad plight of the people of the country, owing either to
entire absence of goods or to acute shortages, known in
Soviet terminology as ‘‘ deficitness.” And no attempt was
made to deny the obvious fact that the shortage at home
was created and encouraged by the monthly increase in
fraudulent exports.