ABSTRACT
The relationship between Australia and Japan as a supplier of raw materials and a manufacturer of increasingly sophisticated goods respectively, has been mutually beneficial. Japan has had an assured source of supply for much of what it needed. Australia looks toward an increasing development of heavy industry in Eastern Asia and to a consequently increasing market for the raw materials that it can supply. The Japanese are understandably uneasy about undue dependence on Australian supplies of raw material. The total effect of greatly increased trade in raw materials between Australia, as a supplier, and Japan, as a buyer, has undoubtedly been to further a closer relationship between the two countries, extended beyond trade and investment to cultural interests and tourism. The changing complexion of the economies of East Asia indicates how unpredictable can be the circumstances in which raw material trade and industrial development would be carried on within a Pacific Community.
