as an industry are equipped to meet the new demands that are placed upon us. In the past our track record for predicting the future accurately leaves much to be desired. Now the stakes are higher and we cannot afford the luxury of error. We cannot altogether escape the fact that the shape of the industry today is in part a product of its past. I would have to credit the A. E.C. with performing a difficult task extremely well under trying circumstances. However, in the beginning the Government paid different prices to individual producers based on their estimated costs of production, and this in turn brought into being producing properties whose costs of production vary widely and I suspect more widely than would have been the case if the usual disciplines of the market place had been present. As a result the ability of individual companies to compete in the free market place varies widely. Furthermore, the curtailment of procurement in by the industry's only customer caused exploration for new deposits to virtually cease and the existing producers for the most part lived off their reserves. Now as a result the reserve position of the individual producers varies widely and fortunate is the company that finds itself now with a strong reserve position of ore that can be produced at relatively low cost. The ability of the individual companies to accelerate their search for new reserves and to expand their operations -5-