As has been pointed out already, these districts accounted for nearly one-third of Germany's production of coal.

But they also supplied no less than three-quarters of her iron-ore production, 38 per cent of her blast furnaces, and 9.5 per cent of her iron and steel foundries.

Unless, therefore, Alsace-Lorraine and Upper Silesia send their iron ore to Germany proper, to be worked up, which will involve an increase in the imports for which she will have to find payment, so far from any increase in export trade being possible, a decrease is inevitable.[127] Next on the list come cereals, leather goods, sugar, paper, furs, electrical goods, silk goods, and dyes.

Cereals are not a net export and are far more than balanced by imports of the same commodities.

As regards sugar, nearly 90 per cent of Germany's pre-war exports came to the United Kingdom.[128] An increase in this trade might be stimulated by a grant of a preference in this country to German sugar or by an arrangement by which sugar was taken in part payment for the indemnity on the same lines as has been proposed for coal, dyes, etc.