International Lead and Zinc Study Group

The International Lead and Zinc Study Group held its third session in Mexico City from March 20 to 24, 1961. Twenty-three of the twenty-five countries composing the Study Group, including Denmark which was admitted to membership at the meeting, were present at the session held under the chairmanship of Ambassador Antonio Carillo Flores, President of the Study Group for 1961. The Study Group decided to curtail lead supplies to a level of approximately 2 percent below estimated world consumption in 1961, in view of the existence of substantial stocks of unsold metal and an estimated surplus of about 90,000 tons of supplies over the record consumption in 1960. Australia, Mexico, Peru, Sweden, the United States, and the members of the European Economic Community announced that they were taking specific actions to reduce mine and/or metal production. In addition, the Canadian industry had previously stated that it was curtailing lead mine production in 1961, and Yugoslavia had made known its intention to reduce either production or exports. In connection with these moves, the United States announced its readiness to negotiate, until May 15, 1961, contracts for the barter of surplus lead stocks accumulated before December 31, 1960, against surplus agricultural commodities. The purpose of this action was to remove some of the accumulated lead stocks. Estimates of supplies anticipated that the lead exporters among the centrally-planned economies (principally the Soviet Union, Poland, and Bulgaria) would not increase the level of their exports above that of 1960. Representatives of the Soviet Union and Poland expressed their intention to cooperate with the other members of the group but were unable to submit essential data; consequently, the world production and consumption figures did not include statistics from the centrally-planned economies.