of 31st May, 1885"
in same paper approving W.O. (War Office) proceedings in the matter)
? Refer to those deep talks
What their wishes are now on this point, and say that these Requr will be transmitted to them
that in order to ascertain the views of the
Harding
the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce (see 1511
the waiting thinking, which Lord
things in framing is unable to say that any
SAA
detailed and request to supply him with another copy of the print for communication to Worthing
Plate sumes a
Fra 19. 19 July
S.W.I.
Euk
hur
2077
useful summary published" apoor of the "Dines"
IN. Meade
Article from this File now annexed
Cround
8ug. 21/7
preford.
a useful summary.
Rm 2117
July
2/
33/3
article
From "The Times" 20. July
THE COMMERCIAL TREATY BETWEEN FRANCE AND CHINA.
The negotiations between France and China for the arrangement of the terms on which trade is in future to be conducted across the frontier between Tonquin and China, which dragged their slow length along for nearly a year at Tientsin, have been completed, and the result of the labours of M. Cogordan, Li Hung Chang, and their numerous assistants has at last reached Paris for ratification. It might have been thought that, as political questions were settled and the delicate matter of delimitation got out of the way by the appointment of a joint commission, it would not be a difficult matter to come to terms for the regulation
of a trade which is still in the clouds. But this has not been the case; over and over again the negotiations stood still for weeks because the representatives of the high contracting parties could not agree on some point. The French entered on the work with the idea that the result of the war entitled them to large concessions, and it is to be feared that the Chinese spirit was even less favourable to a speedy and satisfactory issue. They haggled over points to which they attached no importance themselves, and which, indeed, were of no special importance to either party, in a spirit that looked like mere contentiousness. They appear to have set out with the determination that the French should get as little as possible of what they wanted, whether the withholding of it was of benefit to China or not. French manufacturers expected great things from the war; they were taught all along that a new El Dorado was being opened to them; France was destroying the British commercial monopoly in southern and south-western China, she was cutting out England in the future; and with these great and flattering objects in view the war went on. The Chinese, on the other hand, were determined, as far as lay in their power, to show France that even in a commercial sense she had gained nothing by the war. Li Hung Chang, on being asked to let the French construct railways for China, contemptuously gave them permission to tender for a small line between the Kaiping collieries and Tientsin, and ultimately gave the contract to Messrs. Krupp. The Chinese had this further advantage in the contest (an advantage of which they have not now, as in the past, been slow to avail themselves) that they knew France would not go to war with them again over the negotiations. The nature of the treaty concluded under these conditions can easily be surmised. We look through it in vain for any of those advantages to French trade which were so confidently anticipated; our Chambers of Commerce and merchants can read every line of it without a qualm. There is no provision in it on which even the most nervous official or merchant can lay his hand and say—"There may be danger to us there." Taken by itself, and apart from the antecedent and surrounding circumstances, the treaty is hardly worth a moment's attention; but when we recollect the hopes it has raised in one country and the fears it has caused amongst British merchants at home and in the East, when we reflect that this is the arrangement which was to destroy British commercial predominance in southern China and to blast our inheritance in future trade of south-western China, we cannot pass it by without interest or attention.
We shall, therefore, run rapidly seriatim through every clause of the treaty, giving the substance of each, with a few comments here and there, where they appear necessary, by way of elucidation. By the first article, China agrees to open two places to trade, one on the frontier beyond Langson, the second above Laokai; the first of these will give access to the rich and populous province of Kwangsi, the other to Yunnan. This provision is not new, as it was contained in the treaty of peace signed at Tientsin on June 9, 1885. China will establish customs stations at these places, while France gets the right to appoint Consuls to reside there. This clause also arranges the method in which the places are to be selected. In connexion with this clause, it is interesting to notice that one of the hitches in the negotiation was caused by the demand of the French to appoint an agent to reside at some important centre in Yunnan (Tali-fu and Yunnan-fu were mentioned), as we have an agent at Chung-King, on the Yangtze in Sze-chuan, but the Chinese were inflexible in their refusal. The second clause provides for the appointment of Chinese Consuls in Hanoi, Haiphong, and other towns in Tonquin, with favoured-nation treatment. By Article 3 both sides engage to assist the respective Consuls in obtaining suitable residences. Clause 4 provides for freedom of trade and residence for Chinese in Tonquin and trade and residence under the usual conditions for French in the open places in China. By Clause 5 it is agreed that only those persons armed with passports to be granted by the Chinese can cross the frontier. In this respect the French in Tonquin are at a disadvantage compared with Europeans residing on the coast, who can go and come freely. The 6th and 7th Articles are the most important in the whole treaty; they are also the longest, but their substance may be given in a few words. Imports across the frontier into China pay one-fifth less than the maritime customs dues, and exports one-third. Articles not mentioned in the tariff pay 5 per cent, ad valorem in each case, and all such goods pay the likin, or inland transit dues, in the usual way. On these clauses, which really form the crux of the whole treaty so far as British trade is concerned, two questions arise—What will be the effect of the trade through Tonquin on our trade in southern China? and, should we claim the most-favoured-nation treatment in respect of this reduction of the customs dues? To the first question two of our Consuls in the region affected have already replied that no injury will be done to our trade, for the difficult nature of the country to be crossed between the Red River and the valley of the Si-Kiang, or Canton River, has prevented, and will prevent, much trade by this route until the French construct railways to the frontier, and even then the opening of a port on the Canton River will counterbalance the French advantages. As to claiming the favoured-nation treatment, we did not do so in the case of the Russo-Chinese Commercial Treaty of 1881, and M. de Freycinet has intimated an opinion that the most-favoured nation treatment applied only to the open ports, and not to the land frontiers of China, a limitation of the favoured-nation clause in which Lord Salisbury did not concur. On the other hand, the Board of Trade recommended that the question should be fought on the ground of principle, which, it said, was all-important. "If stipulations for equal treatment in the matter of duties are to be made to depend on, and to vary with the cost of transit (the ground on which the reduction of duties was made) there is an end of any certainty or clearness in the meaning of such stipulations." Notwithstanding this strong recommendation, we believe the Foreign Office has decided not to contest the question at present, and on the whole, perhaps, this is politic. It must be remembered that merchandise from Europe going into China by this route will pay two different customs dues—the first to the French authorities on entering Tonquin, the second to the Chinese on entering China. Discriminating duties existed, or existed until recently, in Tonquin. General Millot, when Governor, divided all imports into three classes, with different scales of duty—(1) Those of Indo-Chinese origin; (2) those of French origin; (3) those of foreign origin; each class paying higher duties than the preceding one. It will thus be seen that a trifling fifth or third diminution from a five per cent, ad valorem tariff can do little to help a trade heavily weighted with these discriminating duties from the moment it enters Tonquin. And even if French goods were admitted free into the latter, this reduction, amounting in the one case to one, in the other to one and two-thirds per cent., would be of little help towards meeting the enormous expense of carriage to Langson, not to speak at all of the distant Laokai. Besides, concluding that the game of fighting the point with France and China was not worth the candle, Lord Rosebery, no doubt, reflected that we shall shortly have the opportunity of claiming similar treatment in the trade across our new frontier in Burma. When France has completely pacified Tonquin, when she has rendered the Red River navigable and constructed railways to the frontier, and when she has remodelled the fiscal system of Indo-China so as to admit goods of French origin free of duty, these reduced dues might, if we have been at a standstill all the time, be of