Dear Sir:
Attention: Mr. R.G. Riddell

I have your letter of July 19th† requesting my comments on proposal, which has been placed on the original agenda of this session of the United Nations Economic and Social Council, for the establishment of a regional Economic Commission for Latin America.

I understand that at the Fourth Session of the Economic and Social Council the Canadian Government expressed its opposition to the establishment of further regional machinery of this type on the grounds that it might contribute to the trend toward excessive regionalization. It was suggested instead that the wider use of functional machinery should be encouraged. Since in the specific case of Latin America, certain regional machinery already exists in the Pan-American Union and the Inter-American Conference, it would seem •that the need for creating still another body of this kind would be quite unjustified and that the Canadian line referred to above should be even more valid.

There can of course be little doubt that the Latin American countries, in common with other "under developed" areas, are now experiencing great difficulty in attaining economic stability, higher standards of living and more balanced economies. Their problems, of obtaining sufficient foreign exchange to acquire the machinery, equipment and other supplies required for their immediate development, and of assuring markets for their products are typical, though possibly somewhat exaggerated versions, of the problems which many other countries are encountering today. I think that it should be unnecessary in reply to the proponents of this (and similar) commissions to do more than emphasize that efforts are being directed on an international level at Geneva and elsewhere toward provision of solutions to these questions. Accordingly, except for the special situations facing the war devastated and dislocated countries of Europe and the Far East, the establishment of further regional machinery at this time should not be required and might in fact only create added difficulties and barriers of the type it is hoped to eliminate or circumvent.

Yours truly,
R.B. BRYCE