the direction of the late Dean R. W. Brock, surveyed the Colony between 1923 and 1935 has now been received. Dr. S. G. Davis visited Canada during the year and is now engaged in re-writing the manuscript which will eventually be published as a Hong Kong Government Memoir. To accom- pany this memoir it is also proposed to print a geological map of the Colony, based on the 1935 edition of the 1/84,480 geological map. All efforts to trace the pre-war geological base maps in Japan have failed.
A book by Dr. S. G. Davis entitled Hong Kong in its Geographical Setting was published in 1949.
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION
Industry continued to expand not only in volume of output, but also in variety of products and in scope of markets. There are now very few corners of the globe to which Hong Kong manufactures do not penetrate. The tendency of Shanghai industrialists to move to Hong Kong continued and it must be confessed that they have brought into the Colony modern methods and machinery, which have proved a welcome and effective spur to established industries. As supplies of raw materials have become more regular and assured and markets more competitive, increased attention has been given to lower costs and to quality, and in particular to the maintenance of standards of quality, but much work remains to be done in this field if Hong Kong is to extend its markets and to keep those captured in the rather abnormal postwar period.
The
Two developments in the latter half of the year consider- ably improved the prospects of certain industries. revaluation of the dollar sterling exchange rate improved their competitive position in some non-sterling markets; while the issue of an open general import licence opened the United Kingdom to a wide range of Hong Kong products which had been excluded since the end of the war. Empire markets and Imperial Preference are still an important element in the prosperity of Hong Kong industry.
Close cooperation between the various sections of Hong Kong industry has again been prominent and augurs well for the future. Its most outstanding manifestation was the annual industrial exhibition, which provides a comprehensive year to year index of industrial development. The 1949 exhibition comprised 417 stalls, displaying a very wide range of products, was visited by over 700,000 persons (as against 600,000 in 1948). Hong Kong was represented again at the British Industries Fair in London on a more ambitious scale than in 1948. There were 95 exhibitors, and a party of 48 industrialists made the journey to London in a specially chartered aircraft.
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