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local labour, employing when working at full capacity
20 Europeans and 1450 native labourers, with a monthly wage bill of approximately $50,000, (figures for March, 1932). On its prosent reduced working its labour has
been reduced to 13 Europeans and 420 natives, and its monthly wage bill is only $15,000 (approx.), (figures for October, 1934). It pays $22,000 per annum to
Government in rates, rent, etc., and it consumes when in full operation 1,000,000 units of electricity per
month. Raw materials, with the important exception
of limestone, are procured from within the Empire, the Empire content of the finished product being 73.7%, while the manufacturing costs of the Company aro 60.9% within
and only 39.1% outside the Colony.
(2) Very largely owing to the fact that Canton has established a monopoly in cement the cemont industry is in an unique position rnong Hong Kong industries in that
Figures there is little or no entrepot trade in cement. produced by the Company for January-June, 1934, showed that while 41,000 tons of cement had been imported into Hong Kong only 16,000 tons had been exported and of these 16,000 no less than 14,000 had been exported by the Green Island Cement Company itself. It was argued, therefore,
that cement alone among Hong Kong industries could be made the subject of a protective tariff without in any
way damaging the cntrepot trado.
(3) It was further argued that the existence of the Green Island Cement Company was of vital importance to the Colony both in peace and war. In peace, because the fact that there was a local company in existence prevented
the price of Japanese comont from soaring to a figure just below that at which other foreign coments could be sold. In war, boerusc cement is a vital factor in the