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CHEFOO
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Committed administered the Municipal affairs of the Foreign Quarter being succeeded in 1910 by an International Committee of six foreigners and six Chinese. The Interna tional Committee was however wound up in 1930 and the Foreign Quarter is now administered by the Chinese Authorities in the same way as the rest of the town. There is a good club, There are two good hotels and several excellent boarding houses, all of which are full of visitors from July to the end of September. The climate is bracing. The winter, which is severe; lasts from the beginning of December to the end of March; April, May and June are lovely months and not hot; July and August are hot and rainy months; and September, October and November form a most perfect autumn with warm days, cool winds and cold nights. Strong northerly gales are experienced in the late autumn and through the winter, and the roadstead gives but an uncomfort- able, though safe anchorage, for steamers. In 1909 nearly two months were lost to trade through,stress of weather. The Netherlands Harbour Works Co. started the construction of a breakwater in 1915. Further harbour improvement works were completed in 1921, the new breakwater, mole and quay being formally inaugurated on September 14th, 1921. The breakwater is 2,600 feet long, the height from the base of the foundation nound to the top of the parapet is 514 feet, and the width of the base of the foundation mound ranges from 117 feet to 133 feet. A railway track has been laid over the mole. In September, 1921, great damage was done to the Bund along the east beach by a storm of unusual violence accompanied by spring tides.
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It was always intended that the Chiefoo-Huanghsien-Weihsien railway should proceed, pari passu with the breakwater. The outbreak of war, however, brought negotiations to a standstill. Another pressing need in Chefoo is a good water supply. The Chefoo-Weihsien motor road was opened to traffic in 1923 and, although 'very unsatisfactorily metalled, is nevertheless very popular.
An enterprise was established a few years ago by a wine company of sub- stantial standing, the soil of the locality lends itself to such an industry. Chefoo is noted for its large and increasing fruit-growing industry, supplying Shanghai, Vladivostock, Kobe and other Eastern ports with foreign fruits, which grow well with care and attention in that part of Shantung-the native fruit-growers having received foreign instruction so that which was at first a hobby is now a paying industry, Other very important industries are the manufacture of foreign silk and hand-made silk laces, which in the hands of foreigners promise to assume large proportions. Silk thread and silk twist are largely made and exported fron here to France and America. The port was connected in 1900 by telegraph cables with Tientsin, Port Arthur, Weiluiwei, Tsingtao and Shanghải.
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TRADE IN 1932
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From the beginning of the year at Chefoo it was feared that if a further straining of relations with Japan occurred it would derange the trade of the port, and this proved to be the case. It was, Japan's preliminary actions in Manchuria during the autumn of 1931 that gave rise to this apprehension, and it did not require much imagination to foresee that if trade associations with her nearest economie neighbour were to be disturbed to a still greater extent, the commerce of Chefoo must receive a serious setback. In view of the remarkable 60 per cent. improvement registered by the statistics of the previous year, the prospect was disappointing in the extreme. As it turned out, subsequent events in Manchuria and in the Shanghai area did aggravate the situation, and both the foreign and the domestie trade of the port of Chefoo suffered considerably thereby, imports being restricted by an intensified boycott of things Japanese, and exports to a great extent losing their Manchurian and Japanese markets. Local eon- ditions also were far from helpful, as hostilities broke out between the two chief military commands in Northern Shantung during the last quarter of the year. While this outbreak unsettled some of the nearby districts for a time, the efforts of the local authorities were successful in maintaining order in the town of Chefoo itself. Taking all these things into consideration, it is not to be wondered at that decreases are shown in the statistics for all sections of the trade of the port.