Viewing page 17 of 131

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

-4-
Road may well be the decisive factor affecting the battle of the Pacific -- and the Battle of the Atlantic.
The economic situation in China has developed favorably despite the war, in line with Chiang Kai-shek's decree to resist and reconstruct. Up to the commencement of hostilities, the hidden wealth in the southwestern and northwestern provinces remained unexploited, while industrial enterprises 1 and technical experts were never fully utilized in any systemic development of China's resources. The war has given powerful impetus to economic reconstruction in China.
After four years, industrial output has been increased, mines have been developed, the heavy industries have been rebuilt, and handicraft and light industries have been encouraged.
Many mines were destroyed and others occupied by the Japanese. A number of large coal mines in Free China have been newly-developed under government auspices in various parts of Kiangsi, Hunnan, Yunnan, Kweichow, Kwangsi, and Szechwan. They will have a combined productive capacity of roughly 800,000 tons a year when engineering and installation works are completed. Additional collieries are being planned. Her coal reserves have been recently estimated at 250 billion tons-- enough to last 10,000 years. In Free China new wells are producing oil in increasing quantities. These may soon replace the annual 145,000 tons of crude oil that have been lost to China since Japaneses occupation of Manchuria.
China's iron reserves are estimated at one billion tons. She has substantial reserves of lead, copper and manganese.
In short, China is in possession of nearly all the potentialities for developing into an important industrial nation, and she holds the key to many of the materials needed by our defense program. 
As to cooperatives -- One reason for China's economic resistance lies in the