CONDITIONS IN PARTICULAR INDUSTRIES. 205

In the German iron industry there are more than 100 different
articles covered by cartel agreement, while the number of iron cartels,
according to official report in 1905, numbered 62.*
Iron.—The history of the iron combinations in Germany shows a
great deal of grouping and regrouping, of organization and dissolution.?
 An example is the Roheisen Syndikat zu Diisseldorf, which
was formed in 1899 from the Rhenish-Westphalian Pig Iron Syndicate
 and the Verein fiir Siegerlinder Roheisen, and undertook the
sale of pig iron for the entire German territory. Its activities were
much condemned in 1900 because of the contracts it forced upon its
sustomers, and in 1993 it was involved in the imperial parliamentary
inquiry into cartels.® Shortly afterwards it was reorganized, but
was finally dissolved in 1908.
The Pig Iron Syndicate~—At present the most important combination
 for pig iron is the Roheisenverband G. m. b. H., Essen a. d.
Ruhr. This union or syndicate was formed in Essen in 1910 and
is composed of iron producers in Rhineland, Westphalia, Upper
Silesia, and the so-called seaboard works. Later the Siegerlinder
group and the Lorraine-Luxemburg works joined the syndicate,
with the effect of creating a monopoly of pig-iron production in
the entire German Empire. This syndicate expires on December
31, 1917, unless previously renewed. It is now composed of three
groups: Group A, consisting of 27 members participating in the
production of pig iron to the extent of 2,260,000 tons; group B,
containing 13 Siegerlinder works, producing for the syndicate
538,604 tons per annum; and group C, consisting of certain Luxemburg
 and Lorraine works, which participated in the production to
the extent of 535,000 tons in 1912, and whose share was to be increased
until it reached 610,000 tons in 1915. These figures represent the
quantity of pig iron available for the general market and for export
purposes. A certain quantity of pig iron may be produced by all
groups for consumption at works. A fax is collected by the syndicate
on each ton of production within the limits of the quantity assigned
for general market purposes, in order to furnish a fund for the
furtherance of export trade:*
The syndicate, which includes all of the producers but four, handles
 the following products: Pig iron; gray iron; malleable iron;
spiegel ; and controls about 97 per cent of these products in the German
 market? No smelters are excluded, and any furnace so desiring
may join at any time.

1 Denkschrift {iber das Kartellwesen, Part I, pp. 24, 27.
3 The history of some of these combinations is briefly stated in Part II, p. 31.
3 A J. Wolfe, Commercial Organizations in Germany, Bureau of Foreign and Domestic
Yommerce, Special Agents Series, No. 78 (1914), pp. 40. 92. 93.
+ Ibid., p. 93.
5 Pt. II. ». 32.