The Pottery Market and Export Associations in the 1930's

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the export regulation of potteries from 1933 to 1936. The barter system and import quota system were adopted extensively after the collapse of the gold standard. Japanese export was rapidly developed in the 1930's. When the other countries imposed import restriction, the export association of Japan regulated the quantity of export and alloted it to the exporters. It was complicated to regulate the pottery export to Dutch India because of the competition between the Japanese and the Dutch importers. The pottery export association of Nagoya controlled the pottery export to Dutch India. As a result, the government of Dutch India repealed the pottery import restriction. In the case of export to the United States, the pottery export associations controlled the lowest price on purpose to prevent the import restriction. But these export regulations which the pottery exporters took the leadership in carrying out was inconsistent with the interests of pottery manufacturers. Therefore the export and the manufacture associations were confronted with each other. When the pottery export associations imposed export regulations to cope with the barter system, it was proposed to compensate the import industries for their losses. The export regulations were the new order of the international trade after the gold standard. In Japan, since this imposition was at odds with the interests of each industry, it differed from the regulations of the home market by a cartel. The controlled economy in the early 1930's had two purposes. First, it was to get over the panic by means of the regulation of demand and supply in the home market. Secondly it was to cope with the new order of the international trade after the gold standard. So, the controlled econymy in the early 1930's shuld be distinguished from the wartime economy in the latter half of the 1930's.