23
There being now 200 dwellings, this works out roughly at $850 a house including temples, and should ensure a good type of building throughout.
The following is a résumé of agricultural resumptions at Shing Mun, which involve the whole of Demarcation Districts 452, 457, 458, 460 and 466.
3-12 acres 1st class padi at 1 cent a square foot.. 132.5 acres 2nd class padi at & cent a square foot... 43 6 acres 3rd class land at cent a square foot...
179-22 acres agricultural land all classes.
$ 1,359.06 43,295.92
9,467.49
$54,122.47
In default of exchanges, as there is very little unoccupied agricultural land in the vicinity of the new villages, cash compensation will be paid, to enable the villagers themselves to purchase privately-owned land in place of their old holdings. With this end in view, an ex gratia payment of cent was added to the usual resumption rates for agricultural land in remote parts of the Territory and included in the above figures. In all cases the new village sites are in a more populous neighbourhood than the old.
Agricultural Land.
Rights.
Each of the eight villages at Shing Mun has a forestry area on which it Forestry plants pine-trees and holds grass cutting rights. The total area thus covered is 1178 6 acres. Just before or after the actual evacuation of the inhabitants, the growing trees will be valued and bought by Government, and the part of the area which will not eventually be inundated, converted to a Government plantation. The cost is estimated at $15,250.
There are 4214 acres under pineapples, in 94 holdings, each holding Pineapples. subdivided into smaller lots. Compensation will be made by Government at the evacuation at $20 per 1,000 growing pineapples, irrespective of age, and in order to encourage the owners to carry on the industry elsewhere, they will have the option of removing the plants. The new villages have where possible been sited with reference to their suitability for pineapple growing, and their proximity to land suitable for forestry and grass-cutting.
Graves will not be interfered with, except where they are within the area to be inundated, when they will be removed by the villagers. No new graves will be allowed.
Extra travelling expenses in connection with the move and payments to fungshui doctors for their services in siting wells and houses are estimated at $700.
The total cost is therefore -
Resumptions for sites Site-preparation...
Wells ...
Houses
Agricultural resumptions...
Forestry resumptions
Pineapple resumptions
Fung Shui or fruit trees Incidental expenses
:
$
Graves.
Incidental
expenses.
Cost.
3,839.31
31,500.00 2,400.00 170,148.00
8,346.00
54,122.47
15,250.00
8,428.00
+
2,165.00
700.00
9th January, 1928.
$296,898.78
J. A. FRASER,
District Officer, North.