PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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C.O. 882
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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Looking at the rainfall returns of Uva, they are the same as in my own district, and that the planting of tea should give the same results as my district. My own results
This is on virgin land. are on the average 650 lbs. per acre.
On fair coffee land, 400 lbs. an acre may be safely estimated as an average. not known so low an average.
I have
In planting tea on land formerly planted with coffee in 1842, I have had the best results. The growth has been as great, if not greater, than on young land: I now refer to 142 acres planted.
I am quite satisfied that it would be a safe calculation to rely on 400 lbs. of tea
I am quite confident of this. an acre generally as an average, from the Uva district.
It will be all important to the tea-planter to get his tea, even when headed up in boxes, quickly to his shipping terminus. I know nothing which deteriorates so rapidly. It is very important that they should get quick and clean transport.
This applies with greater force to tea than to coffee.
It costs me 1 cents per lb. for sending my tea from the estates to Colombe.
This is the case of full chests. Regarding chests, the tare is about 25 per cent.
Labour.-Taking the yield at 400 lbs. per acre of tea, the amount of labour is double year round. that required for coffee, and this all the
Without the facilities of railway, Uva will be heavily handicapped. This is owing to the cost of transport up of chests and lead. Tea comparatively feels the cost of I put this at 25 per cent. additional in the transport up more than coffee and cinchona.
way of expense.
I have planted up pataas with tea at Maturata. My experimental patch, three years old, is giving me 446 lbs. per acre. Uva side will give equal results.
From what I learn, selected patanas on the
I do not think that the Sinhalese will take up tea-growing among the villages.
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I have seen red spider" among tea plants. It comes in March and September.
It prevents the flush growing.
I have not seen any serious harm from it.
I have experience of all the known blights, but no harm has resulted beyond a temporary one. Notwithstanding the blight referred to, I am certain the yield will still be what I have stated.
Manure. It is necessary to manure tea.
The effect is more lasting than in the case of coffee. The manure I used, with very successful results, was when the tea was 5 years old. It cost me about Rs. 23 a ton.
It will be of great advantage to a district to get manure at a rate which is not prohibitive.
Tea to my knowledge will stand 65 days' drought. The average yield was not interfered with.
In higher and denser elevations the better the quality of tea.
I have known 1,117 lbs. per acre produced from Maria-waula. On a patch of my own (3 acres) I have got 2,000 lbs. an acre.
Mr. JAMES IRVINE.
I have lived in Uva for 25 years, engaged in planting coffee. I was there eight months ago. I know the whole of the province. I have had nearly all the estates in my hands in one way or another.
I believe that the coffee in the high lands will continue to give returns for many years, but that it is certainly decaying in the lower elevations.
The general outturn from the province at large will be more likely to decrease than not. I am aware that in a few cases the crops last year in Uva were the heaviest on record.
The high estates for 20 years will continue to give good crops. In the lower elevations coffee will decay, in many cases rapidly. If we had had more facilities for our coffee, better prices and better transport, we should have done very much better.
The current season's crop will be a poor one.
Looking at the proposed rates, I am quite certain that we shall in a few years put so much traffic on the line that those rates can be reduced.
Even if the cart rates were 10 per cent. less than the proposed rates, we shall still use the railway. The cart rates cannot go below the current rates. The cart men could not feed their bullocks.
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The most important point, if the railway were made, would be that we shall have certainty of transport and general convenience. It would be equivalent to two or three months' interest on the entire value of the crop of an estate.
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Frequently I have seen the whole transport of the country at fault through murrain among the cattle. Goods have been left three months on the roadside for want of transport.
The ordinary rate for coffee down was Rs. I per bushel, and it has gone up to Rs. 17. I have paid Rs. 10 and Rs. 11 per bushel for rice, the normal rate for rice in Badulla being Rs. 4.
There was often difficulty to get enough food for the people to live upon. There was a serious murrain last year, but I was not in Badulla, and cannot say what was the price of rice.
Manure.—I used manure largely. Bone-dust cost me 100 per cent. at the very least when landed on the estate.
I believe that the rate (Rs. 18. 10 per ton) at Haputale will enable the planters to use a large quantity of manure, and that it will pay better in the case of tea than it would ever have done for coffee. The returns from using manure will be quite certain in the case of leaf.
I have planted cinchona very largely in Uva. I believe that cinchons will for many years give as large returns as in the past. The plantations are more healthy. It is thoroughly well established. You may say this with confidence.
I have been in Madulsima during the last few months. There the cinchona has hardly been touched. It all looks healthy and lasting.
So far as the railway is concerned, would not anticipate, as regards coffee or cinchona, any falling off in the traffic to be thrown on the line.
After four or five years
I expect some decadence in the coffee, but it would be more than replaced by tea.
Tea. (1) Yes.
(2.) Over the whole district.
(3.) The rainfall of the district is very varied, but very ample. The soil of Uva is peculiarly adapted for tea. The climate is so also. The longest drought I recollect in Uva is six weeks.
Uva is distinctly a leaf-producing district.
(4.) I think that 400 lbs. per acre would be a very safe estimate for tea on ordinary land-coffee land. The coffee land in Uva is far from being played out.
(5.) I have sampled my little of tea from Uvs, but what I have was good, strong, highly flavoured tea.
(6.) A tea estate in full bearing will take at least 25 per cent. more labour per acre than is required for coffee; more especially if hands are used in the factory. The labour will be required throughout the year, which is not, of course, the case as regards coffee.
(7.) Some of the Patana lands will grow tea very well. Nearly the whole of the Patanas below the railway trace are suitable for tea. There is a large extent of such land.
The Uva Patanas are suitable for planting trees for fuel.
(8.) I consider the railway to Uva an absolute necessity if the province is to be advanced at all. Without a railway I do not think that Uva can compete with the Kandy side in the cultivation of tea as the up-transport will be so heavy.
Grazing
-I do not think the Patanas very suitable for cattle grazing. The opening
of the railway would not induce planters to start grasing farms.
I think that Natives would cultivate tea at Uva.
Nuwara Eliya, 15th April 1886. Present:-All the Commission. Discussion regarding the Badulla returns, up and down. Calculations as to probable receipts on the railway. Portion of draft Report laid on the table.
Nuwara Eliya, 16th April 1886. Present:-All the Commission.
Discussion of the Report.
Mr. PEARCE.-Main line, working expenses per mile of line, High rate, because we have been substituting steel for iron rails. finished.
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Rs. 11,663 for 1885. It is to a great extent
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