2 WHAT EXPORTS MEAN TO US Q. How does the American loan affect the export drive? The need for exports is A. as great as ever. The loan gives us a lift along the road to recovery and speeds the whole programme of our reconversion. It provides ready dollars to buy raw materials for our factories, and to help with the food supply — dollars which would otherwise have taken a long time to earn. In the long run we still depend on our export trade to buy us our imports — and also to earn dollars to pay back the loan and the interest.