2
}
The European market is thus very important and the scale of the
container service now being planned is very large indeed with the rest
**
of the Far East it is likely to contribute the largest container service
in the world. Ex port figures do however underestimate the importance of
trade with Japan to Hong Kong, since there is a very large essential import
of such things as building materials from Japan into Hong Kong. Hong Kong's imports (again using 1968, cif) totalled $468 m from Japan, compared with $449 m from Europe (UK $ 184 m.) and $299 m. from
Hong Kong's
total trade value therefore ranks as follows:
1
the U.S.
$ m.
Europe (U.K.
962
461 )
U.S.A.
936
Japan
522
Australia
91
Singapore
79
Canada
70
Hong Kong's trade with Japan is much less suited to container operations than those with Europe and the United States. 'Many of the imports are of low value and rates of freight on the trade are low. Many of the cargoes are unsuitable for containers and it is difficult to see how a container operation The large Japanese Lines have not been at all prominent on the trade, and have left it to smaller operators like Oyama himself.
Apparent with could be viable except on a marginal, wayport basis. backing of the Japanes Газартаат мот
All this is supported by the bidding pattern. H.K. Government let it be known that they did not want speculative tenders for the container berths. We understand that Kowloon Wharf, an established wharf and go-down company (not to be confused with KCW), made enquiries as to how much business might be offering for a common user berth and concluded that there was insufficient cargo for them to put in a viable bid. Oyama's own figures are hard to interpret. We are advised by our Tokyo agents that he carries about 300,000 B/L tons p.a. in all (both ways) between Hong Kong and Japan, which in theory might constitute about 20,000 container loads (20') p.a. or 1 thousand a month. In practice the figure expressed as container loads must be looked at in the light of what has been said above about the nature of argoes on this
trade.
His own figure of 70,000 tons a month should not be related directly to berth capacity for the same reason. His direct estimate of containerable cargo is put in terms of pieces (pcs), a term used in the Far East to mean items or packages. In this context it must mean numbers of packages for stowing in containers, not numbers of container loads; the latter would give
'Numbers too high a figure in relation to his own total carryings figure.
of packages' are of course a very imprecise measure. It is significant that the number of picces he says he is carrying now in containers is very much less,