This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government
OPIUM.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[13903]
No. 1.
со
24845
[April 13.]
REC
(REGE 28ECTION 12.
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received April 13.)
(No. 98.) (Telegraphic.) P. OPIUM.
Peking, April 13, 1911.
I have received the following telegram from Sir A. Hosie, at Yünnan-fu, dated yesterday:
*
Having travelled from Szechuan through Eastern Yünnan, I arrived at the provincial capital yesterday. On the great plain of Chaoting-fu, formerly devoted to the cultivation of opium, and the plain of Tengchuan-fu, which also used to produce opium on a large but less extensive scale, I found that none had been grown for three seasons. On proceeding inland west and south-west from Tengchuan-fu, I found that opium was being cultivated in the Huitse district of that prefecture, but the amount was not large, and also in the department of Hsuntienchao, where it was planted by the roadside, within 40 miles of Yunnan-fu, and in the sub-prefecture of Chiao-chia Ting. I found altogether seventy-two plots during seven out of my ten days detour. The largest of them measured 300 by 100 yards. Away from the main roads, this may be taken as fairly representing the general condition of opium cultivation.
With regard to the west of the province, His Majesty's consul at Tengyueh estimates that there has been an increase in the area under opium in the purely Chinese zone among the hills in the whole of the frontier districts from 27,000 English acres in 1910 to 43,000 in 1911, and in the quantity of piculs of opium produced from 5,000 to 8,000, although the plant has disappeared from the plains, where it was recently cultivated on a large scale.
"For the whole of the province of Yunnan I am inclined to estimate the reduction since the enforcement of preventive measures at about 75 per cent.
"Yesterday a proclamation was issued by the Viceroy by which the export of stocks of opium is permitted for four months from the 30th March to the 25th July through Mengtze alone, on condition that double the native customs duty and li-kin is paid. This is equivalent to a tael a catty, or 63 taels per 1,000 Chinese ounces. Mengtze the opium must all be sold to an official opium department, by which 20 Haikuan taels customs export duty is to be paid."
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