Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1938, Page 166

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LE NORD
thus works under somewhat different conditions, it will be seen
that there are nevertheless fundamental similarities in their
structure, and that they largely produce the same goods. The si-
milarity has been accentuated by the movement away from corn
growing and in the direction of dairy farming, which has been
stimulated by the competition of overseas corn. There was a time
when Denmark was the granary of Norway, but that was in
another cultural epoch than the one we are living in now. As long
as they continue to concentrate on animal husbandry and dairy
farming, the Northern countries do not need each other’s agri-
cultural products under normal conditions. All the Northern
countries import corn and export products of animal husbandry.
In the Danish balance of trade this export is of momentous im-
portance. In that of Finland and Sweden, and especially in that
of Norway, it counts for less, as the agriculture of these countries
has its principal market at home.
It is only under the stress of an extraordinary scarcity of
goods, like that which prevailed during the Great War and in the
period immediately following the armistice, that Danish agricul-
tural produce can find any market to speak of in the rest of the
North. As late as 1916, Sweden and Norway were hardly buying
any Danish butter at all, but in 1917 6.85 million kilogrammes
were exported to Sweden and 0.57 million kilogrammes to Nor-
way. This exceptional Scandinavian market for Danish butter
did not last long: by 1924 it had almost entirely disappeared.
The same thing happened to the increased market for Danish
meat which existed in Sweden and Norway during the same
period.
The demand of our Northern neighbours for foreign products
of animal husbandry has been on the decrease during recent years,
and even if Denmark started to export corn, she could hardly
compete with overseas corn on the Northern markets — unless
she was given a strongly preferential position there.
Possibly an increase of the inter-Northern exchange of goods
might be brought about artificially by means of political measures,
such as some kind of tariff arrangement. There are several forms
which such an arrangement might conceivably assume. The States
in question might e. g. grant free entry or tariff reductions to
each other’s goods, while continuing to apply their individual
tariffs to the outside world. This would be a regime similar to
that which prevailed between Sweden and Norway during the