Self-sufficiency target
We now import about a third of our food and most of our wood and raw materials, but our exports of manufactures have declined in the face of growing competition with the cheaper goods of developing Asian countries.
As a result, the UK now has a large and growing deficit in the balance of its overseas trade in food, goods and services - 33 billion in 2003.
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Hide AdOur aim should be to move nearer to self-sufficiency in food and goods. A degree of trade protection may be needed for farming and manufacturing industries, and the public should be prepared to pay a little more for its food and goods in order to secure supplies.
Our birth rate of 1.7 children per woman should be allowed gradually to reduce the population to a level supportable by our limited resources. But the government permits a large influx of immigrants. The nation's most urgent need is to bring a near stop to any further immigration.
(PROF) JP DUGUID
Merlewood Road
Inverness