1841-1886
PAPERS RELATING TO
this year. However, these anticipations have not been verified; I have sold the Opium Farm for 1882-83 for $210,000 so there has been no falling off in the current revenue, which is $205,000.
Increase in Junk Trade and in Foreign Shipping.
Now, in looking through the items of revenue which I am putting upon the table, you will see that in this return it states that there is a considerable increase in what are called fees of office. The increase in 1881 amounted to $20,215. On analysing that increase, which I do from a return furnished me by my honourable friend, the Colonial Treasurer, Captain Deane, I find the items of that increase are of importance in considering the question of the prosperity of the Colony. I find, for instance, that the items for licenses and fees of junks, which amounted in 1880 to $18,807, increased in 1881 to $19,839. Now, between the years 1880 and 1881, there was also an increase in the foreign shipping, and the foreign steamers purchased by the Chinese. The junk trade has to compete with the coasting steamers, and when we find that the trade of the coasting steamers, and the general foreign shipping of the Colony increasing at the same time with an increase in the junk trade, we have a combination which shows the prosperous state of the commerce of this Colony. With regard to the foreign shipping, I have not yet before me the final returns, but as you are aware, the revenue from the light dues furnishes a certain criterion for the increase or diminution of the foreign shipping trade. I find that the increase on light dues of foreign shipping amounts to $2,660. Well, that seems in itself a small sum, but when you remember that the light dues only amount to one cent. per ton, upon the foreign shipping the small apparent increase means an increase of 266,000 tons of foreign shipping in one year in the harbour. I believe that the tonnage of foreign shipping cleared and entered in Hong Kong in 1881 exceeded 8,800,000 tons. There are a few other items, which, though apparently small, undoubtedly indicate mercantile prosperity; those are the increase of our revenues from cargo boats and cargo boats' certificates, from the shipping of sailors, and from the examinations of masters and engineers, upon all of which items there is an increase in the past year. Under the head of miscellaneous receipts, I find an increase in the revenue from the storage of gunpowder and kerosine. The total amount of revenue under the head of miscellaneous items in 1880, was $6,695, whereas in 1881, it was $18,294. The taxation of the Colony is at the present moment at precisely the same figure as it was when I first became Governor of Hong Kong in 1877, and the increase of revenue in five years, from $885,308 to $1,309,428, is therefore an increase of revenue dependent solely upon the progress and prosperity of the Colony.
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