Vegetables are collected by the Organization's lorries and con- veyed to the Wholesale Market in Kowloon where they are sold under the supervision of the Organization's staff. A deduction of 10% is made from the wholesale price to cover handling and marketing costs.
During the year the quantity of vegetables handled by the Organization increased considerably. Before the war vegetable production was only sufficient to meet 1/5 of the Colony's needs. It is now estimated that, even with the present large population, local producers are supplying not less than 5/8 of the requirements of the Colony.
The Organization has received valuable aid from Colonial Devel- opment and Welfare funds. Grants and loans from this fund have enabled it to purchase a fleet of 16 diesel-engine lorries and have helped in the establishment and running of small village vegetable collecting centres. In recent months two such centres have been established in which farmers themselves have taken over most of the work previously handled by the Organization. In time it is hoped that these centres will be registered as cooperative societies.
In 1947, the first full year of its existence, the Organization handled 19,427 tons of local vegetables and 7,658.7 tons of imported, of which the total wholesale value was $7,348,690. These amounts have steadily risen each year, and the corresponding figures for 1950 were 36,173 and 13,036 tons respectively, at a total value of $16,650,928. The average price of all vegetables per picul rose during this period from $16.1 to $20.18 in 1949. In 1950 there was a slight fall in price, to $20.14.
FORESTRY
Hong Kong derives its water supply from thirteen reservoirs which to a large extent obtain their water from surface run-off into catch-waters running along the contours of the hillsides. As there is a total average annual rainfall of 84.26 inches, most of which occurs between June and September, and as the hillsides are very steep, the strict maintenance of an adequate forest covering becomes a necessity, not only to reduce erosion to a minimum in order to avoid silting up the reservoirs, but also to increase the seepage run-off and extend it as far as possible into the dry season when water shortage becomes acute, especially since the surface run-off is normally more than adequate to fill all the reservoirs before the end of the wet season. Consequently it is not surprising that afforestation work has been largely concentrated on the catchment areas with the object of restoring and maintaining a forest covering, so much of which disappeared during the war years.
The catchment area most urgently needing reafforestation was in the neighbourhood of Kowloon reservoir in some parts of which severe surface erosion is in evidence. Extensive planting of eucalyptus and tristania was carried out but the soil and climatic conditions on the hilltops are rather too severe to support vegetation and con- sequently it is necessary in the first place to establish a forest
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