4. We are now informed that January loadings are not 2 million tons, and that although likely to be more than stand at 1.85 million tons, they February loadings now further demands for military operations. may fall owing to and February is in fact not likely The to total for 3.6 January million tons the total loadings for so that be substantially below 7 million tons. The loading programme set out in the Annex to this report will, therefore, have to be scaled down accordingly. It impossible to forecast what the level of is still quite loadings or of importation will be in the subsequent period of the year, but we feel bound to report at once that (a) The Ministers of all three Importing Departments (Ministries of Food and Supply and Board of Trade) view with some disquiet the results in their respective spheres which would result from loadings of only 7 million tons in the current quarter.