Mr. D'EWART. It seems to me that since 75 percent of the chromium of the country is in that deposit, we should be in a position to make it available in case of immediate need.

Dr. BOYD. I would feel much happier if we had it operating today,

I assure you.

Mr. D'EWART. I hope you make every effort to get it in that stage, even if we don't have the last word in processing.

Mr. REGAN. What do we finally understand about the copper price? It is 241⁄2 in the market today?

Mr. D'EWART. That is right.

Mr. REGAN. And it will go to what point?

Mr. D'EWART. Seventeen would be the floor for all practical purposes.

Mr. REGAN. If it goes to 15, then what happens?

Dr. BOYD. Then the Government has to pay at 17, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. REGAN. The Government buys at 17. All right.
The Chair recognizes Mr. Budge, of Idaho.

DMA ADMINISTRATOR BOYD ASSURES APPLICANTS HAVE "EVERY LIKELIHOOD IN THE WORLD" OF OBTAINING LOANS IF PROPER JUSTIFICATION FILED Mr. BUDGE. As you are probably aware, there are some mines in Idaho, too. I am not familiar with the background of your program, but I do know that your program started a miniature gold rush in my State. People are running around all over the State and have been for months. They have employed attorneys to fill out these forms, engineers to assist them, they have sent people back to Washington, my office is flooded with inquiries, and I am just wondering if you will give me your own honest opinion as to what likelihood there is of these people actually obtaining these loans if they are approved in your office.

Dr. BOYD. There is every likelihood in the world, Mr. Budge. If they have filed a proper justification for loans, there is no inhibition on it now, except the time of getting it processed.

Mr. BUDGE. I have one particular case in mind where the attorney came back and went directly to your office. He left here a month ago and informed me that his application was in perfect order and would be processed, and so far as he could tell, approved in your department. I have had two letters from him since, two or three telegrams, and he has heard nothing from your office, although I called the office myself.

Dr. BOYD. I don't know the particular case, Mr. Budge.

Mr. BUDGE. If these people are being kidded under this program, I think we should know it and we can save a lot of wasted effort and money.

Dr. BOYD. Well, I assure you that we are not kidding. We are desperately trying to do this thing as rapidly as we possibly can. Mr. BUDGE. I am happy to have your assurance.

Dr. BOYD. I wish it were possible to do all those things. As a matter of fact, if the people out in the West would refrain from coming here and insisting on individual discussions with our staff members, we might get this job done a little faster. We have a tremendous number of unnecessary and time-consuming visits from outside.

Mr. BUDGE. I assume that that is true. However, they don't seem to have much success getting information unless they do come back

here and then apparently it hasn't been too satisfactory,

Dr. BOYD. I think they find it unsatisfactory because they can't get a definite answer immediately. I sympathize with them. I fully agree.

Mr. BUDGE. I wouldn't say 4 or 5 or 6 months was immediately. However, I just want your assurance that this is an honest program and you are not just kidding the people out there.

Dr. BOYD. I assure you we are not kidding.

Mr. REGAN. Mr. Crawford.

DMA, INTERIOR DEPARTMENT, DPA, ODM, BUREAU OF THE BUDGET, TREASURY DEPARTMENT, AND STATE DEPARTMENT HAVE FINGERS IN THE MINERALS PROGRAM

Mr. CRAWFORD. Does the State Department have anything to do specifically with this program?

Dr. BOYD. No, sir.

Mr. CRAWFORD. Does the Treasury Department?

Dr. BOYD. No, sir; only insofar as we have to go to Treasury to borrow funds under the authorization from Congress.

Mr. CRAWFORD. The Department of Commerce?

Dr. BOYD. No, sir.

Mr. CRAWFORD. Does any other department-what other departments of Government then have direct entry into this program? Dr. BOYD. Only the Defense Mobilization Administration, the Defense Production Administration, the Department of the Interior, and the Bureau of the Budget.

Mr. CRAWFORD. All right. That is the reason I asked if the Treasury Department had anything to do with it.

Dr. BOYD. The Bureau of the Budget is not in the Treasury Department, Mr. Crawford.

Mr. CRAWFORD. How many blocks are they away from you?
Dr. BOYD. The width of the White House, I assume.

Mr. CRAWFORD. The Treasury and the Bureau of the Budget fit hand in glove. You can go to the Treasury-you can't run the Treasury without the Bureau of the Budget and vice versa. Apparently there is a lot of difficulty here and I want you to straighten me out on what departments of Government are involved in this difficulty. If this comes down to one department of Government, we may be able to make some progress. You know and I know that the State Department has a lot to say about what goods come into the United States and what dollars go out of the United States. You see what I mean now?

Dr. BOYD. Yes.

Mr. CRAWFORD. If this whole program comes down to one department of Government, it may be possible to straighten it out.

Dr. BOYD. Perhaps I didn't answer that question correctly. Insofar as the domestic operations that we undertake here under this bill are concerned, the State Department has-there is no place that they do have a say in the question. If we start dealing with foreign supplies, then, of course, we must discuss the question with the State Department.

Mr. CRAWFORD. Sure. So going back now, do you want to say that the State Department, the Treasury Department and the Department of the Interior and the Budget Bureau and the appropriating ma

chinery of the Congress all have something to do with this program? Dr. BOYD. Yes.

Mr. CRAWFORD. Of course they do.

DMA ADMINISTRATOR BOYD ACKNOWLEDGES ENACTMENT OF MINERALS SUBSIDY BILLS INTRODUCED IN RECENT YEARS WOULD HAVE LESSENED PRESENT SHORTAGE OF STRATEGIC METALS

Mr. BENNETT. If the mineral subsidy bill that Mr. Engle and others sponsored 2 or 3 years ago had been passed by Congress and had been in effect for 2 years, what would our mineral supply condition be as against what it is now?

Dr. BOYD. I am sure I couldn't give you a quantitative answer to that question. Certainly under any kind of a bill of that type, there would have been more minerals produced in the industry. We would have been better off certainly.

Mr. BENNETT. There would have been a less critical shortage of all the strategic metals, would there not?

Dr. BOYD. In my judgment that is true, I am sure.

Mr. BENNETT. And we would have had a larger stockpile of metals? Dr. BOYD. That is right.. I don't know how much. Whether it would have been an important amount or not, it would be hard to judge that.

Mr. BENNETT. If they spent $80,000,000 a year, if the $80,000,000 had been spent to subsidize and get some of these mines in operation, it is safe to say that the supply of critical minerals would be substantially larger than today?

Dr. BOYD. Yes, that is true.

Mr. BENNETT. We have mines in Michigan that are closed up, filled up with water simply because they couldn't operate at the market price that has been in effect in the last few years. Had a subsidy program been in effect, those mines would have been operating and a vast supply of copper would be presently available to the Government, would it not?

Dr. BOYD. Yes.

Mr. BENNETT. What is the present production of domestic copper? How does it compare with the present demand?

Dr. BOYD. I will have to give you rough figures. I don't have it definitely in my mind. The domestic production of copper, new virgin copper, is about 900,000 tons. There is about a third more imported, so I would say that our domestic production is about threefourths of the demand.

Mr. BENNETT. So that we are dependent on foreign production for 25 percent?

Dr. BOYD. 25 to 30 percent.

Mr. BENNETT. That is on present requirements, would you say? Dr. BOYD. That is on a consumpton basis. It is a little difficult to determine what the total demand would be, whether there is sufficient copper to go around.

Mr. BENNETT. Is copper any less critical today than it was 6 months ago?

Dr. BOYD. No.

Mr. BENNETT. Is it any greater?

Dr. BOYD. It is possibly a little more critical.

Mr. BENNETT. Than it was 6 months ago?
Dr. BOYD. Yes.

Mr. BENNETT. We have spent millions of dollars, I don't know how many millions because it is hard to get that information out of ECA, but we have spent millions of dollars since ECA was put in operation on the subsidizing of foreign copper production, have we not?

Dr. BOYD. I am not sure that we have. I don't know enough about the program in detail, but I would doubt that we had done any subsidizing production. The ECA assisted mines to get in production in areas under their jurisdiction.

Mr. BENNETT. We spent money to increase foreign production of copper, that is what I am trying to say.

Dr. BOYD. Yes; that is true; sure.

Mr. ENGLE. Will the gentleman yield, so I can put something in the record here?

I have a report from Mr. Wilson before-and I am reading from page 40 of his Report to the President, No. 1, dated April 1, 1951-he says:

To boost American production requires an increased flow of many strategic commodities from Europe, Africa, southeast Asia, Latin America, and Canada. The output of such products is being increased in many cases by private enterprise, stimulated by recent price increases. In addition, in some cases, the United States Government is furnishing a substantial share of the risk capital needed to develop resources or of the funds needed for research and new transportation facilities.

Although much more needs to be done in this field than has yet been undertaken, a number of development projects are under way, financed in part by the United States. These include copper, lead, and zinc, French Equatorial Africa and Morocco; industrial diamonds, French Equatorial Africa, British Guiana; bauxite, Jamaica; tungsten, Portugal; nickle, New Caledonia; chrome, Turkey and New Caledonia; zinc, Italy and Greece; tin, Belgian Congo.

If the gentleman will yield for one further observation: The gentleman comes from the district where Calumet and Hecla operates in copper?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes.

Mr. ENGLE. And when the copper price dropped low enough so that some of the company's mines could not operate except at a loss they were closed and they filled with water; isn't that right?

Mr. BENNETT. They have had that happen in several mines, not recently but years ago, 15 or 20 years ago, I think.

Mr. ENGLE. They were in operation during the last war, were they not, to some extent?

Mr. BENNETT. Some of them were and some of them closed since the last war.

Mr. ENGLE. If it had a little premium and had kept going those mines would still have been available, would they not?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes. If the premium-price plan had been put into effect 2 years ago those mines would be in operation today, at least by today.

DETERMINATION OF PROJECT FEASIBILITY

I would like to ask Dr. Boyd one or two questions on feasibility. That before a project, a minerals project, clears your Department, that the final thing you do is to issue what is known as a certificate of feasibility; is that true?

Dr. BOYD. No; I have never heard that term used in that way. What we do is recommend-there are several things to do. In the case of a loan we recommend that the loan be granted under certain terms. We would assume, before we made that recommendation, that the project was feasible, and we would determine that it was feasible, so when we recommend the loan we would say that it was feasible and could return the loan.

Mr. BENNETT. Before a project is feasible, you have to say it is feasible?

Dr. BOYD. Yes.

Mr. BENNETT. What are the factors that go into determining whether a given project is feasible?

Dr. BOYD. It will depend on each individual case. Is the ore reserve there, for instance? Is there any chance of the ore being there to make a project warranting expenditure of Government funds? Are the materials and equipment in short supply?

Mr. BENNETT. Is the cost of getting it out taken into consideration? Dr. BOYD. Yes; it is.

Mr. BENNETT. What factors did you consider there?

Dr. BOYD. Cost?

Mr. BENNETT. Yes. Take copper, for instance. What price would you consider unfeasible, put it that way. Suppose you have a known deposit and application was made for a loan and you know how much copper is there and then it gets down to a question of how much it is going to cost to get that copper out.

Dr. BOYD. At the moment we are trying to get those projects going that can produce at the market price, so we would have to determine whether it is possible for them to produce at the market price.

Mr. BENNETT. You are not considering projects where there is any likelihood that the cost is going to be greater than the present market price?

Dr. BOYD. Not at the moment.

Mr. BENNETT. Do you intend to consider projects of that kind? Dr. BOYD. We will when we know that the requirement for copper is sufficiently high to demand it.

ADVANTAGE OF PREMIUM PRICE PLAN DISCUSSED

Mr. BENNETT. Most of the projects that are not in operation are not in operation because they haven't been able to operate at market price; isn't that true?

Dr. BOYD. No; there are a number of projects that are before us today that couldn't have operated at 17 or 12 cents price, that could operate at the 2412 cents price.

Mr. ENGLE. Yes; but Dr. Boyd, a lot of copper people would get into operation if they figured they could get 2412 cents, but they are not going to start because these metal prices fluctuate so sharply.

Dr. BOYD. That is the reason we are entering into these contracts with them, to assure them of a floor at a price of 242 cents.

Mr. ENGLE. I don't object to that, except I think the premium-price plan is better. If you don't put in a premium-price plan, it is better to do that because you are never going to get metal production in this country until you assure the mining industry a market and the only