Trade Leaders Research Articles

REGIONS AND COUNTRIES - LEADERS OF MODERN WORLD TRADE: WHAT'S NEW?

This article analyzes the main parameters of world trade in goods and services by aggregated export and import items, by regions of the world and leading countries. As a result of the changing geopolitical situation in the world, when developing countries are trying to change the old world order (with the hegemony of Western countries over the United States), the conditions of world trade and the share of certain countries in global export and import indicators are changing. The analysis of world trade is based on statistical data from the UN, WTO and other international organizations. The change of world trade leaders at the regional level has been revealed. Thus, Asia's leadership is fixed in commodity exports and imports, but the developed countries of the West lead in the export of commercial services. The leader of world trade is currently China, ahead of both the United States and Germany.

Trade policy and foreign trade of the European Union

Economic globalization is characterized by an increase in international trade and growing interdependence of economies at the global level. The EU's trade policy is a central tool for responding to the challenges associated with globalization and other modern challenges, such as the consequences of the pandemic and the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, and turning its potential into real benefits. In other words, the trade policy of the European Union is a significant lever in shaping the competitiveness of the EU in the world market and is based on a wide range of various measures, which determines the relevance of this study. The subject of the study is the peculiarities and prospects of the development of trade policy and foreign trade of the European Union. In turn, the goal is to analyze the specifics of trade policy implementation and the current state of the European Union's foreign trade. It was found that bilateral international agreements play a decisive role among EU policies. But there are also unilateral policy measures that also have a huge impact on the state and performance of foreign trade. Among them are tariff and non-tariff regulation methods. It has been found that despite the fact that the EU's share of world trade has been falling in recent years, it remains at a high level and is a key basis for growth, competitiveness and employment in the EU. At the same time, the EU's export and import dynamics have a tendency to grow, which indicates that despite the decline in the EU's share in world trade, the EU's position as one of the world's trade leaders will strengthen, but competition will grow. To achieve the set goal and solve research tasks, modern methods of scientific research were used in the performance of scientific work, in particular, general scientific and special methods of analysis of economic phenomena and processes: systematic approach, comparative analysis, historical-logical method, comparative analysis, economic-mathematical modeling, and namely: trend analysis. Therefore, the growing indicators of the EU's foreign trade prove that the EU's trade policy is successful.

COVID-19 Implications for China's National Security

The COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020 and China has since been under public scrutiny for neglecting the first signs of this global health challenge and for its lockdown strategy. Although lockdowns have not lasted for long, China needs to confront the political, social, and economic implications for its national security. The paper aims to fill a gap in the knowledge and investigate aspects of China’s national security in light of the pandemic. The study is based on desk research using secondary data and statistical and comparative analysis. It also employs an inductive method to build general theorems. The Chinese government can be seen as successful in dealing with the pandemic because of a low death toll and minimal economic losses. By early February 2022, only 106,863 Chinese had been diagnosed, and 4,636 had died from the virus. China also achieved enviable economic success and, its output grew by 18.3% year on year in the first quarter of 2021, the fastest rate since the 1990s, and it was the first major economy to withdraw its pandemic stimulus. China consolidated its position in low-income countries and improved its image as a global leader in trade by supplying vaccines, masks and ventilators, and strengthened its geopolitical standing. It will face threats from other countries working on a joint approach to the challenges posed by Beijing and while the aftereffects of the crisis can be seen, it also fears that they might further affect China's national security.

Multipolarity of the world trade: challenges and "corridor of opportunities" for Ukraine

The paper discusses trends of the world trade development towards multipolarity that is caused by the increasing impact of “newly emerged” leaders, in particular China, and weakening of the domination of “traditional” transatlantic leaders. The development of multipolarity in the world trade is supported by the processes of trade regionalization, especially by signing of megaregional trade agreements on the base of the current balance of power in the world trade. The details of the regional trade agreements concluded by the world trade leaders – USA, EU and China are described. The academic discussion on the role of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) leads to the conclusions that creation of RCEP will induce the creation of a new world trade pole in Asia and the Pacific region during the next decades, where China will play a leading role. The future of the World Trade Organization and the WTO fundamental principle of multilateral trade relations is the most controversial issue in connection with the development of multipolarity of the world trade. Challenges that were faced by the WTO due to trade digitalization, COVID-19 pandemic and climate changes are analyzed, alongside with sources and causes of the WTO crisis. The spreading of economic patriotism (nationalism) trend that manifests itself in trade as a policy of protectionism is discussed in the context of the transition to multipolarity in the world trade . The development of multipolarity in the world trade is followed by the processes that must be considered in the shaping of Ukrainian trade policy. The ability of Ukraine to get its “space for maneuver”, which will allow to increase the country’s economic potential in the framework of the new world trade configuration, depends upon this country’s trade policy that is grounded on the analysis of risks and opportunities in the trade relations with “major players” in the world trade. Development of the trade with China creates significant risks of the increasing of raw materials orientation of export and strengthening dependence on the import of industrial goods from China. Vital risks also follow signing of the credit and investment agreements with China. Chinese investment in agriculture and food industry are the riskiest as they use natural potential of the recipient countries and Chinese technologies to diversify the sources of the food import to China. The shaping of the Ukrainian trade policy with the EU countries in the medium term will be influenced by latter’s new trade policy of Open Strategic Autonomy. The main challenge is created by the EU plans to implement the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which provides for the import tax on the import of the electricity, cement, aluminum, fertilizers, and products from steel and iron. The opportunities, created by the new EU trade policy for Ukraine have emerged due to the EU’s declared support to the countries of the Eastern Partnership that have DCFTA with EU, including green and digital transition. The principle of “autonomy” in the new EU trade policy emphasizes the EU’s ability to make its own choices, reflecting its strategic interests, which has features of the policy of economic nationalism and protectionism and will create a “corridor of opportunities” for pursuing protection measures for the development of domestic industries.

Багатополярність світової торгівлі: виклики і «коридор можливостей» для України

The paper discusses trends of the world trade development towards multipolarity that is caused by the increasing impact of “newly emerged” leaders, in particular China, and weakening of the domination of “traditional” transatlantic leaders. The development of multipolarity in the world trade is supported by the processes of trade regionalization, especially by signing of megaregional trade agreements on the base of the current balance of power in the world trade. The details of the regional trade agreements concluded by the world trade leaders – USA, EU and China are described. The academic discussion on the role of Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) leads to the conclusions that creation of RCEP will induce the creation of a new world trade pole in Asia and the Pacific region during the next decades, where China will play a leading role. The future of the World Trade Organization and the WTO fundamental principle of multilateral trade relations is the most controversial issue in connection with the development of multipolarity of the world trade. Challenges that were faced by the WTO due to trade digitalization, COVID-19 pandemic and climate changes are analyzed, alongside with sources and causes of the WTO crisis. The spreading of economic patriotism (nationalism) trend that manifests itself in trade as a policy of protectionism is discussed in the context of the transition to multipolarity in the world trade . The development of multipolarity in the world trade is followed by the processes that must be considered in the shaping of Ukrainian trade policy. The ability of Ukraine to get its “space for maneuver”, which will allow to increase the country’s economic potential in the framework of the new world trade configuration, depends upon this country’s trade policy that is grounded on the analysis of risks and opportunities in the trade relations with “major players” in the world trade. Development of the trade with China creates significant risks of the increasing of raw materials orientation of export and strengthening dependence on the import of industrial goods from China. Vital risks also follow signing of the credit and investment agreements with China. Chinese investment in agriculture and food industry are the riskiest as they use natural potential of the recipient countries and Chinese technologies to diversify the sources of the food import to China. The shaping of the Ukrainian trade policy with the EU countries in the medium term will be influenced by latter’s new trade policy of Open Strategic Autonomy. The main challenge is created by the EU plans to implement the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), which provides for the import tax on the import of the electricity, cement, aluminum, fertilizers, and products from steel and iron. The opportunities, created by the new EU trade policy for Ukraine have emerged due to the EU’s declared support to the countries of the Eastern Partnership that have DCFTA with EU, including green and digital transition. The principle of “autonomy” in the new EU trade policy emphasizes the EU’s ability to make its own choices, reflecting its strategic interests, which has features of the policy of economic nationalism and protectionism and will create a “corridor of opportunities” for pursuing protection measures for the development of domestic industries.

Structural and regional characteristics of the world retail trade leaders

The state of development of world retail trade through the prism of the TOP 250 retailers functioning is considered in the article. As part of the study the main performance indicators of Top 250 retailers for 2013-2020 have been analyzed. The world's leading retail trade networks have been performing positive dynamics of their development and a slight increase in the values of indicators. This might take place due to the stabilization of the level of globalization of retail trade as the result of active development of e-commerce and m-commerce. Retailers were also affected by such negative macroeconomic factors as slow economic growth in major developed economies, high levels of debt in emerging countries, deflation or low inflation in rich countries, a protectionist backlash against globalization, troubled credit markets in some countries, and worsening demographics in many countries. The size of retail revenue in 2020 helped us define five groups of trade networks. In addition, we determined the share of Top 250 companies by region/country in 2013-2019 and their revenue. The companies from Europe and North America have shown leading positions in the structure of Top-250 retailers in terms of retail revenue share in 2013-2019. The analysis of the features of expansion policy manifestation by trade structures, depending on the region of their origin, have been conducted. The European trade networks, which in 2019 were present on average in 18.3 countries has demonstrated the largest internationalization. The structure of Top 250 companies by product sector is considered as well. FMCG companies were dominated in the structure of the Top 250 retailers. Special attention has also paid to determining the place of European retailers in the Top 250 in the framework of the European model of retail development. This model assumes an active presence of trade networks in the markets of foreign countries.

Multidimensional Analyses Reveal Unequal Resource, Economic, and Environmental Gains and Losses among the Global Aluminum Trade Leaders

Disputes around trade inequality have been growing over the last 2 decades, with different countries claiming inequality in different terms including monetary deficits, resource appropriation and degradation, and environmental emission transfer. Despite prior input-output-based studies analyzing multidimensional trade consequences at the sector level, there is a lack of bottom-up studies that uncover the complexity of trade imbalances at the product level. This paper quantifies four types of flows, monetary, resource, embodied energy use, and embodied greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, resulting from aluminum trade for the four economies with the highest aluminum trade, that is, the United States, China, Japan, and Australia. Results show that the United States has a negative balance in monetary flows but a positive balance in resource flows, embodied energy use, and GHG emissions. China has a positive balance in monetary and resource flows but a negative balance in embodied energy use and GHG emissions. Japan has a positive balance in all flows, while Australia has a negative balance in all flows. These heterogeneous gains and losses along the global leaders of aluminum trade arise largely from their different trade structures and the heterogeneities of price, energy use, and GHG emission intensities of aluminum products; for example, Japan mainly imports unwrought aluminum, and its quantity is 3 times that of the exported semis and finished aluminum-containing products that have similar energy and GHG emission intensities but 20 times higher prices, while Australia mainly exports bauxite and alumina that have the lowest prices, the quantity of which is 25 times that of imported semis and finished products. This study suggests that resource-related trade inequalities are not uniform across economic and environmental impacts and that trade policies must be carefully considered from various dimensions.

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AS A MODERN PRINCIPLE OF PLANNING THE DEVELOPMENT OF A SECURE BUSINESS IN TRADE

The increasing role of society as a factor in the development of a company actualizes the introduction of the corporate social responsibility concept, its boundaries and its impact on economic results. The implementation of corporate social responsibility activities and programs forms a positive image of the company as of a responsible employer, manufacturer and counterparty, which simultaneously strengthens the company's competitive position and increases its level of security. Nevertheless, the integration of environmental and social programs into the company's business processes requires investments and, respectively, the coordination of these projects with strategic business development initiatives to ensure a certain balance between desired goals and real opportunities. That is the reason for the relevance of researching the practice of planning of socially targeted events and determining the relationship between their implementation and the performance results of the company. The article considers the current practice of implementing the principles of corporate social responsibility in the activities of world trading companies in the context of ensuring their economic security. The author of the article investigated the level of implementation of corporate social responsibility tools in the practice of 19 world trade leaders in terms of their turnover. It is proved that trading companies with high rates of corporate sustainability implement social initiatives in accordance with the developed plans and strategies for their implementation. The author identifies priority areas for the implementation of social projects of trading companies, among which the most common are creation of decent working conditions, gender equality, implementation of educational initiatives to rationalize consumption and production in terms of human physiological needs and careful use of resources, of the fight against climate change and their consequences. The hypothesis regarding the dependence of business economic security on the activity of implementation of corporate social responsibility projects was also checked. Based on the correlation analysis, a direct relationship has been established between corporate sustainability indicators and the main performance results of trading companies, which determine their level of economic security.

Торговельне співробітництво України та Великої Британії: сучасний стан і перспективи

The article is aimed at determining the current state and prospects for the development of trade cooperation between Ukraine and Great Britain. For Ukraine, cooperation with the the United Kingdom as one of the world’s trade leaders can be a promising direction. The dynamics of foreign trade in goods and services of Ukraine with Great Britain are provided. The increase in Ukrainian exports of goods may continue after the Great Britain leaves the EU, as, unlike other EU countries, Great Britain pursues a less protectionist policy on agricultural products. The commodity structure of exports and imports, as well as changes in the structure of foreign trade in the services of Ukraine and Great Britain over the past 5 years are analyzed. The main commodities exported by Ukraine are ferrous metals, grain crops, fats and oils of both animal and vegetable origin. The structure of British imports of goods is dominated by goods with high added value. Great Britain is one of Ukraine’s main foreign trade partners in the trade in services. A positive process for Ukraine is the increase in the share of services exports in the sphere of telecommunications, computer and information services. It is determined that trade cooperation between Ukraine and Great Britain during the researched period is characterized, in general, by positive dynamics. Positive changes include a gradual reduction in the negative balance of Ukrainian trade with great Britain due to faster growth of Ukrainian exports. At the same time, the unresolved problem remains low-diversified exports of Ukraine with low added value. Prospects for further trade cooperation between Ukraine and Great Britain in the context of signing the Agreement on Political Cooperation, Free Trade and Strategic Partnership between Ukraine and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland are examined.

Does a scopic regime erode the disposition effect? Evidence from a social trading platform

A scopic regime constitutes a state of permanent reciprocal observation and scrutiny among participants. We investigate whether this environment reduces the disposition effect among retail traders as they are constantly scrutinized by others, thus driving them to realize and limit their losses. We use two anonymous data sets, the first from a popular social trading platform (STP) governed by a scopic regime, and the second from a traditional foreign exchange broker. STPs allow participants to interact and copy each other’s trades using mirror trading, thus implicitly creating two groups; trade leaders who execute unique trades to build their performance record, and copiers who allocate funds to be managed by the former. We find ample evidence of a weaker disposition effect among trade leaders in the scopic environment compared to traders in a traditional setting. Our findings suggest that a state of constant observation and scrutiny erodes the disposition effect as individuals become more self-conscious of their actions and limit their losses to avoid tarnishing their public trading record.

Understanding the Trade Imbalance and Employment Decline in U.S. Manufacturing

Economic analysis suggests that a trade war with China can neither stop the decline in American manufacturing employment nor eliminate the U.S. trade deficit, but it could significantly reduce the welfare of American consumers by making U.S. imports of Chinese goods more expensive. Moreover, it could cause the United States to lose its global leadership in free trade and globalization and facilitate China's rise as a world leader in trade and commerce. A better approach may be for policymakers to design policies that can ensure fair redistribution of the gains from free trade among American citizens and to reform the education system to prepare students for future jobs that require knowledge of automation and artificial intelligence.

Does a scopic regime produce conformism? Herding behavior among trade leaders on social trading platforms

ABSTRACTSocial trading platforms (STPs) are transparent online markets governed by a scopic regime, where order flow is publicly disclosed and participants are subject to constant reciprocal scrutiny. Participants on STPs can be categorized into trade leaders and copiers, where the former execute unique trades and manage the funds allocated to them by the latter in return for compensation. Given limited individual capacity and the competition to attract copiers, we investigate whether the scopic regime produces excess and perpetual conformism among trade leaders. Using data from a popular STP, and from an anonymous traditional foreign exchange broker, we show that the scopic regime produces excess levels of herding. Under the scopic environment, we find that herding is high when market information is scarce, which is evidence of herding due to informational cascades. We find herding to be relatively low among risk-seeking trade leaders, which may be a sign of overconfidence. Herding is high for larger trades, suggesting that traders herd to avoid the disappointment associated with underperforming on large positions. Finally, we show that herding in the scopic environment persists at much higher levels compared to traditional environments. Our findings indicate that exposure to a scopic information-rich environment augments the limitations and personal biases of individual traders, thus producing excess and perpetual herding.

АСОРТИМЕНТНА ХАРАКТЕРИСТИКА ПРОСТАТОПРОТЕКТОРІВ, ЗАРЕЄСТРОВАНИХ В УКРАЇНІ, РЕСПУБЛІЦІ ПОЛЬЩА ТА РЕСПУБЛІЦІ БІЛОРУСЬ

Мета роботи. Вивчення особливостей формування aсортимeнту лікарських засобів (ЛЗ) для лікувaння прoстатиту в Україні, Республіці Польща (РП) та Республіці Білорусь (РБ).Матеріали і методи. Матеріали дослідження – дані офіційних джерел щодо реєстрації ЛЗ в Україні, РП та РБ станом на 01.08.2017 р. Методи дослідження – системний, статистичний, аналізу порівняння, ранжування, узагальнення.Результати і обговорення. Встановлено, що в Україні набагато більше (в 1,3 раза) торгових назв (ТН) простатопротекторів (ПП), ніж у РБ, проте удвічі менше, ніж у РП. Лідерами серед зарубіжних країн -виробників в Україні є Німеччина, Індія, Італія, Нідерланди, в РП – Німеччина, Велика Британія, Нідерланди, Франція, в РБ – Україна і Росія. У кожній з досліджуваних країн зареєстровані ПП виробництва лише 9 із сукупності 30 держав, а саме Німеччини, Італії, Нідерландів, Угорщини, РП, Іспанії, Румунії, Словенії та Чехії. Найбільшу частку усього асортименту зареєстрованих ТН ПП в Україні та РП займають aнтагоністи альфа-адренорецепторів, в РБ – інші препарати, що застосовують при доброякісній гіпертрофії передміхурової залози. Показано, що має місце використання контрактних форм виходу на досліджувані ринки. Виявлено, що на цих ринках існує висока залежність ПП від імпорту. Встановлено, що дев’ять з десяти ТН ПП на українському ринку зареєстровано у вигляді лікарських форм (ЛФ) для перорального застосування, решта – супозиторії і парентеральні ЛФ. На ринку РП присутні тільки ЛФ для перорального застосування. На ринку РБ понад чотири п’ятих ТН ПП представлені пероральними ЛФ, десята частина – супозиторіями, решта – парентеральними ЛФ.Висновки. На підставі аналізу даних офіційних реєстрів ЛЗ України, РП і РБ станом на 01.08.2017 р. визначено особливі та схожі характеристики ринків цих держав за асортиментом ПП, структурою їх виробників і заявників, форм виходу на ринки, асортиментною залежністю від імпорту та видом ЛФ. Отримані результати є важливими для подальшого формування aсортимeнтної політики щодо ПП в Україні.

USA’ role and place in international trade

Article is dedicated to the role and place of USA in international trade. The author pays great attention to the transformation of the international trade leaders since 2004, when China got the entrance to the TOP-3 of merchandise trade leaders. At the same time the author described the structure of USA’ foreign trade by commodities and services. He underlined the key feature of USA’ trade partners - EU countries, Canada, Japan (developed economies) and China, Mexico (developing economies). The author pays great attention to the questions of setting and developing of “mega” integrations, such as TTP and TTIP.

Regulatory Differences in the Approval of GMOs: Extent and Development over Time

AbstractConsidering the regulatory approval developments for cotton, maize, and soybean within the time period 2000–2013, this paper assesses the extent of asymmetry in the authorizations of new genetically modified organism (GMO) events between importing and exporting countries. The results show an increase in the asynchronous approval across the majority of country pairs. However, focusing only on commercialized events and considering only regulatory approval differences in which the importers are more stringent than the exporters, the asynchronous approval is considerably lower, and the result indicates that the major trade leaders have synchronized their approval status for GMOs over time. Some countries, such as Norway, Switzerland, Thailand, and Turkey seem to face the highest potential for trade disruption, while the opposite holds for Japan and South Korea.

Socio-economic Foundations of the Democratization in Modern Azerbaijan Society

The BRICS have emerged as a major global force in the global economic arena, with the balance of economic power shifting dramatically towards Asia over the next decades. With 43 percent of the world’s population, 46% of the global labour force, 30% of the earth’s landmass and 25% of the world share of GDP, the BRICS countries, apart from complementing their respective economies in terms of resource exchange are also the major suppliers to the industrial world. With a cumulative global trade of 20 per cent and generating more than 40 per cent of global economic growth, the BRICS countries, and India specifically as a prominent global leader in trade, are poised to strengthen their relationship through intra-BRICS trade. Between 2001 and 2014 intra-BRICS trade increased nearly 15 times. It is increasing at an average rate of 28 percent annually and currently for USD 300 bn and also the bilateral investment flows among BRICS countries are also on rise - the total FDI inflows into BRICS reached a peak of US$ 322 billion in 2013. In this context the present paper makes an attempt to assess the intensity of trade relations between the BRICS countries and further hypothesize the potentiality of commodity trade among them with respect to 14 distinct sectors. The Study observes that the BRICS countries are complimentary rather than competitive to each other in the various sectors analyzed and presents a greater potential of multilateral trading regime among them which could accelerate the South-South trade.

Intra-BRICS Trade & Its Implications for India

The significance of international trade was highlighted by the leaders of the BRICS group of countries as they met for their Sixth Summit in Fortaleza, Brazil in July, 2014. The BRICS group, made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, came together calling for an Action Plan for advancing its work on trade and investment.With a cumulative global trade of 20 per cent and generating more than 40 per cent of global economic growth, the BRICS countries, and India specifically as a prominent global leader in trade, are poised to strengthen their relationship through intra-BRICS trade.This Discussion Paper, using a series of analytical tools, illustrates the trends in trade and competitiveness between the BRICS countries as well as its implications for India. Tellingly, the results indicate a complementarity in export and import products with low levels of competition, which can provide opportunities for enhanced intra-BRICS trade.A greater openness between the BRICS countries has the potential to yield gains for all five of the member countries. Specifically for India, which showed a comparative advantage in certain products, it should re-orient its Focused Market and Focused Product initiatives in light of its "new trade policy", which is expected to be announced in August 2014, to ensure greater and closer trade with its fellow BRICS members.

The BMA and trade union democracy: new style council elections

Trade leaders must be answerable to their membership just as members of parliament are to their constituents. So the government decreed in the 1984 Trade Union Act that no member of a principal executive of a may vote in that body unless elected by members of the by secret ballot.1 This means that the BMA will have to make some constitutional changes if it is to continue to represent doctors and to do so within the law. Ironically it was an Act of parliament 150 years ago?the Poor Law Amendment Act?that launched the BMA on the road to unionism. In 1835 the three year old Provincial and Medical and Surgical Association?precursor of the BMA?set up the poor law committee with the aim of improving the intolerable working conditions of doctors employed under the amended poor law legislation. From that start through Lloyd George's national insurance legislation of 1911 and the introduction in 1948 of the National Health Service to the complexities of the 1984 Griffiths management reforms the BMA's trade union activities have steadily expanded. Today the BMA is a unique combination of professional organisation, union, and limited company. The association almost lost its functions in the early 1970s when a Conservative administration introduced legis? lation to control activities. The BMA did not fulfil the requirements for being included in the statutory register of unions that was to be set up. After unsuccessfully arguing that professional negotiating bodies such as the BMA and the Royal College of Nursing should not be excluded from the scope of the Act an initiative by the association persuaded the government to include such organisations in a special section of the proposed register.2 Thus the BMA was able to continue with its activities

Regulation of the Perishable Food Industries After the War

SOON after the armistice was signed the license regulations of the Food Administration were gradually abrogated, except as they related to domestic food stuffs in short supply, or to foods that were exported in large volume. The license regulations were designed to eliminate injurious speculation, hoarding, extortionate profits, unfair and wasteful trade practices, and to direct the course of food stuffs in straight lines from producer to consumer through the essential trades without unnecessary cross trading. The Food Administration created a sentiment among the parties interested that supplemented the powers of the Lever Act. It held conferences with representatives of the trades, appointed advisory committees of the producers and the trades, and appointed trade leaders in the Food Administration to interpret the problems of their industries to the government. By this method a patriotic sentiment for national service was developed on the part of the public at large and particularly among those who were subject to the Food Control Act. It was the policy of the Food Administration, on the signing of the armistice, to relieve the public of war-time restrictions, return the trades to a peace basis at the earliest moment, and, at the same time, protect the public against abnormal rises in prices. The Food Control Act ceases to be effective when the existing state of war between the United States and Germany shall have terminated. When it was announced that the special license regulations governing the distributors of perishable foods would be abrogated, general regret was voiced by dealers in fruits and vegetables, poultry, dairy products and fish, that the reforms which were introduced into the trades as a war measure should be lost. Notwithstanding the reaction against further governmental interference in business, protests were heard in all parts of the country against a return to peace-time distributing methods, and a sincere inquiry was begun into permanent legislation that might be 183