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practica lly disappeared.
It seems to me that this will
apply to Japanese goods in the future, as well as the
When and if the river opens to foreign goods,
present.
it should how ever not apply to the latter, since passage
up country through the Japanese lines appears to present
no great difficulty.
•
A few days ago a member of the staff of this
Consulate-General extensively visited shops selling Japanese
He found for sale all kinds of Japanese foodstuffs
(tinned and fresh), cigarettes, beer (Kirin & Asahi)
goods.
ma tches, toilet articles, a small amount of table glass,
and in two shops, Japanese bicycles. There were no
luxury goods and no textiles. Bales of Kimonos were sto red,
but not on sale, in one shop.
Cheap Japanese food stuffs,
such as dried fish a mi fresh apples are also on general
sale either in the market or in retail Chinese shop s.
3.
It is true that goods normally sold locally by
foreign firms are being retailed at prices far lower than
those quoted by their local agents. In the case of kero-
sene, the Asiatic Petroleum Compa ny state that at the
present rate of sale their stocks will last for 20 months
as against four months at full existing sale rates of
there were no smuggled competition owing to the fact
that smuggled kerosene is being sold at a lower price than
that at which the firm can sell it.
4.
-
The Asiatic Petroleum Company inform me that
this kerosene
comes from Formosa and, efter military re-
quirements have been met, the balance of each shipment
is sold on the open market for military yen by Idsumitso
Shokai, a Formosan firm. They have sold different con-
signments at Military Yen 11.50, 13.00 and 14.00 per unit
resp ectively, in accordance with the fluctuations in the
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