Word: pulp
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Late last week Defense Advisory Commissioner Edward R. Stettinius Jr. made a cheerful announcement. For the first time in 30 years the output of the U. S. wood-pulp industry practically equaled U. S. consumption. Production this year, said he, should hit a record 9,000,000 tons, up 27% from 1939's 7,107,000 tons. Furthermore, if U. S. pulpsters bring old, inefficient plants into action, they can boost production another...
Last year the U. S. was the world's No. 1 pulp importer. Of the 2,026,209 tons it imported, more than half came from Scandinavia. The U. S. is still the No. i importer, but now it is also the No. 2 world pulp exporter, second only to Canada. Fortnight ago the Department of Commerce announced U. S. pulp exports in July hit an all-time high of 65,548 tons, nearly six times a year ago. Raw-materials Watchdog Stettinius added that full-year shipments would total 400,000 tons (mostly to the United Kingdom, Latin...
From this lush new export market (where prices are $10 to $21.40 a ton over the domestic level) U. S. pulp makers are skimming the cream. But they do not consider it permanent. A break in the British blockade would release a tidal wave of low-cost Scandinavian pulp, force prices far below anything U. S. mills could meet. Already pulpmen have had reason to be leery of the Latin-American market. Last spring, after Norway's collapse, they were hounded by Latin-American purchasing agents. Suddenly the agents vanished. Nazi salesmen had promised them low-priced pulp deliveries...
When the U. S. pulp markets lost access to Swedish and Finnish pulp, prices zoomed. Unbleached sultite rose from $40-42 a ton at the end of 1939 to $50 in 1940's first quarter, to $63-50-$67.50 last week. Although the 1,235,000 tons of chemical (sulfite and sulfate) pulp which the U. S. imported from the northern countries last year were only a quarter of U. S. domestic production, they played a disproportionately large part in fixing pulp's market price, because most domestic pulp is used by the same integrated paper mills that...
Last week the Defense Advisory Commission, whose price-hawk is Economist Leon Henderson, met 17 pulp & paper men (including Richard J. Cullen, president of vast International Paper & Power Co.) in Manhattan, got an agreement for no further rises. Both sides agreed on one important fact: total U. S. pulp-producing capacity is enough for all needs, except for a few specialties. Then, said the Commission, there is no excuse for carrying pulp prices higher. Pulpmen agreed that further price changes should result "only from actual changes in basic costs." Blamed for the pulp squeeze by both sides were "psychological factors...