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Sir J. Jordan, in his despatch No. 348 of the 23rd July, 1918, states that fully 70 per cent. of the whole foreign education of China is at present in American hands. The whole effort. he notes. is practically sustained by missionary associations, and the Americans can always count on receiving money for any new enterprise they may think desirable, whereas in British missions the eternal want of pence hampers all their efforts. The report on British education in China made by the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce in 1918, see Appendix XIV. states-
There are under American control in China 7 universities. 15 colleges, 140 middle or secondary schools, In addition, the Y.M.C.A.. an American organisation, directs ten ordinary schools, four or five medical schools, as well as special schools for theology, agriculture, &c. The number of American men and women employed in these schools is 523. British missionary societies have established about fifty schools, but these are for the most part starved for lack of funds. There are no British institutions, except the recently founded Hong Kong University, which confer degrees."
A Committee is being set up (1921) under the auspices of the Foreign Office to investigate the question of education for Chinese and to make concrete suggestions.
XXUL--British Employees under the Chinese Government.
A list of British interests in China would not be complete without mention of the large number of British subjects employed by the Chinese Government as expert advisers or as assistants in administrative work. I do not know of any complete list of such foreign employees. But in the Chinese Maritime Customs alone 1,148 foreigners, representing seventeen nationalities, are employed; and of these a little more than 50 per cent. are British. Out of an indoor staff of 235 persons, 114 were British in 1921. The Inspector-General, Sir Francis Aglen, is a British subject in accordance with the assurance given by the Chinese Government in 1898 At the time that this assurance was given the Chinese Government reserved this right of appointing an inspector-general of another nationality, should the trade of some other country become greater than that of Great Britain. It may be observed en passant that the Japanese statesman. Viscount Kato, in his confidential talk with Mr. Alston in June 1919, touched upon this subject and remarked that "the increase in Japanese trade might soon enable his country to claim priority
J
Sir Reginald Gamble, Foreign Associate Chief Inspector in the Salt Adminis tration, is also a British subject, and so is a large proportion of his foreign staff of about forty persons. A considerable number of British subjects are also employed
in the Chinese Postal Administration.
l'ompetition in China.
PART II.-Our Competitors.
Our principal competition in the past has been with Germany, since Germany traded largely in the saine lines as we did. German competition has for the time being been swept away, and it is doubtful whether it will recover for many years. Neither France nor Russia have been formidable rivals. It is clear that our principal competitors in the future will be Japan and the United States of America. These two countries have geographical advantages with which we cannot compete moreover, they each take a very large share of China's export trade- United States of America in silk (which is China's most valuable export), hides and egg products, and Japan in beans, beancake and bean oil (the second most valuable export), raw cotton, iron ore and pig-iron flour, wheat wool, fibres, ground-nuts, sesamum seed. This development of the export trade has naturally assisted in increasing the volume of imports. But the Japanese are handicapped by the hatred with which they have inspired the Chinese, and by the poor quality of their goods: and the Americans by their inexperience of the China market, and by the absence of a mature development of banking and shipping facilities.
United States of America.
We must recognise, however, that both of our most dangerous competitors lay great stress on the national spirit in trade, and both are actively engaged in extending their commercial interests in China," In Shanghai alone 100 new
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American firms, amongst which are included several banks and shipping companies, started business in 1919 (see Appendices VII and VIII). Especially in the supply of iron and steel, in machinery and, to a certain extent, in cotton fabrics, American competition has been keenly felt. For instance, the supply of motor-cars to the Far East has become practically an American monopoly. The Jones Act, which has become law in America, though not yet fully put into force, appears to aim largely at a monopolisation of American trade in the Pacific for American ships. It is a manifest threat to Japanese and British tonnage transporting goods from China to the United States; and seeing that the American mercantile marine has increased from 2.027,000 tons before the war to 16.350,000 tons in July 1920, it is clear that the threat is not an idle one. An independent interest in railway finance and construction in China commenced in 1916 with the Siems-Carey concessions, although as members of the first consortium the Americans were already concerned in a share of the Hukuang lines. The Standard Oil Company has tanks and factories in China, and the Singer Sewing Machine Company agencies throughout the country. The General Electric Company has a share in an electric bulb factory at Shanghai (China Lamp Company, Japan-American), and the Western Electric Company a share in a telephone factory in the same city (China Electric Company, Sino-Japanese- American). Americans have three albumen factories at Shanghai, and a refrigeratory at Tsingtao. At Tientsin a Sino-American flour-milling company has begun operations with a mill, which is to be the first of a comprehensive system of mills to be erected by the same company at various centres in North China." The company will later engage in the pressing of bean-oil and the making of macaroni; another American concern at Tientsin has begun work on a new cold-storage, meat- packing and egg-albumen plant. An American syndicate is prospecting for metals in Yunnan. American interests are attacking the position held by the Marconi Company (British) and the Mitsui Company (Japanese) in the supply of wireless telegraph installations for China, the Federal Wireless Telegraph Company having secured a contract for important installations at Shanghai, Peking, Harbin and Canton. Finally, the lead taken by America in the formation of the new loan consortium, and the fact that the American market alone is at present in a position to find the ready capital which China's development so badly needs, will greatly enhance America's prestige in China and assist her commercial and industrial expansion. America is also greatly assisted by her large share in missionary and educational work in China (see Appendix XIV), by the return of half her Boxer indemnity, and by the fact that she has never joined in the scramble for concessions or territories. Chinese regard America as their one disinterested friend.†
Japan.
Japanese competition is more to be feared than American, because their Government recognises that they must keep the Chinese market or cease to exist as a great commercial country." Japanese commercial expansion in China has beer fostered by every possible means, by Government undertakings like the Sout Manchurian Railway, by subsidies to shipping, industrial and other concerns, by diplomatic pressure exerted & outrance, as in the case of the Twenty-one Demands, and by a series of purely political, non-economic loans which can only be described as the systematic purchase of leading politicians in China. Japanese financial control of China has been considerably strengthened since the days before the war, when Japan had to rely on the support of the London market for funds to promote her policies abroad. Now it is Japan and America who will carry the British and French share in forthcoming consortium loaus. During 1917-18 it is estimated that Japan invested between £20.000.000 and £30,000,000 of her war profits in financing (and corrupting) China. As securities for these loans the Chinese have pledged railway revenues. salt revenues, native customs revenue, iron, tin, and antimony mines, forests, bank stock, (e.g., Bank of Communications), shares in the Lanchow Coal Company (which is part of the Kailan Mining Administration), telegraph property, wireless telegraph property, provincial revenues, &c. It has been said that, since 1917, the corrupt Government of China has pawned to the Japanese every national asset on which it could lay hands. The principal Japanese bank for financing the China trade and for making loans to the China authorities
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Many of these firms have since gone out of business.
†This is a favourite statement of American writers and speakers, but the fact is that, in business matters, the American reputation in China is not good.
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