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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
885/26
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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is to be obtained. For this purpose the production will be required of handbooks analogous to the Handbooks of Standing Information, of which, in the case of certain foreign countries, some have already been compiled by the Foreign Office for official use. We understand that a series of such handbooks may be produced for foreign countries, and we think that similar volumes should be issued for the more important Crown Colonies and Protectorates in the first instance, leaving the question of issuing handbooks for the less important territories for later considera- tion. These handbooks should, where this can conveniently be done, deal with several territories in one volume. They should be revised and re-issued periodically as occasion may require, and they would be supplemented by the Annual Reports of the Trade Commissioners.
A suggested table of contents has been prepared by a Sub-Committee consisting of Mr. Tennyson and Mr. Oldham with the assistance of Mr. Glenny. This table of contents, and draft instructions which have also been drawn up by the Sub- Committee, are given in Appendix 3, and their adoption is recommended by the Committee. Arrangements should be made with the Department of Overseas Trade with a view to ensuring that the Handbooks and the Trade Commissioners' Reports shall be drawn up in a form which will enable them to be used as supple- mentary to one another.
9. The point of view of the persons interested in Colonial produce is, of course, different from that of the British manufacturer. They will be less interested in the provision of permanent Handbooks, but they will be interested in up-to-date Trade Reports. From their standpoint also it has been represented to us that Trade Reports should be separate and distinct from reports on branches of Govern- ment administration, and, further, that they should be written by officers specially qualified and selected for the work. As instances of the kind of subjects with which Reports of this kind should deal the following have been mentioned to us :- (a) The quantity and condition of local crops; (b) movements of currency; (c) agri- cultural or mining developments extending it may be over more than a single year; or (d) a general review of the production of some vegetable article, such as rubber, copra, or sisal, or the occurrence of a mineral such as wolfram, or monazite sand, or bauxite in more than one colony.
Local merchants may also be benefited by information as to (e) movements of trade, its decrease or increase; why, for instance, the export of tapioca from the Straits or of logwood from Jamaica has declined; (f) how far goods are now shipped direct which formerly used to go vid the colony; and similar questions. All such needs, it would appear, can be adequately met by the proposed system of reports by the Trade Commissioners.
10. On a consideration of this side of the subject it appears that a good deal of information that is of value from this point of view is contained in existing Colonial publications, e.g., reports of Agricultural or Mining Departments. Too often however the reports are not sufficiently known, and are not presented in a convenient form. We think that the defect could be met if the reports of the proposed Trade Commissioners contained reference to such reports, or in cases of importance, a brief synopsis of them. The Trade statistics compiled by the local Governments should also be useful, but they are often published too late to be of value. This should be remedied either by rapid and separate publication by the Government or by publication through special reports from the Trade Com- missioners. General reports on certain articles have been mentioned as desirable [see (d) above]. Some reports of this nature have from time to time been published by the Imperial Institute, but are naturally rather of a technical than of a com- mercial character. Whether the Trade Commissioners will afford material for the Department of Overseas Trade to issue general monographs on metals or vegetable or animal products written from a commercial standpoint is, we feel, primarily a question for that Department to determine, but of the advisability of their publication we have little doubt.
Information of the kind mentioned above under (e) and (f), e.g., the decline of an entrepôt trade may be very important to a Colony. To afford useful information on such questions requires knowledge extending considerably beyond the bounds of the colony, and the Trade Commissioner should be in a better position to furnish it than any local official.
We are glad to learn that the Board of Trade propose that it should be part of the duty of the Trade Commissioners who may be appointed for the Colonies not
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possessing responsible Government and Protectorates to endeavour to promote the interests of the Colonies or Protectorates to which they are sent and that it is pro- posed to instruct them :-
(a) Carefully to observe the movement of the export trade from their districts to all markets and to make this export trade the subject of special consideration in their Annual Reports to the Board of Trade;
(b) to communicate from time to time to the local Government any informa-
tion of importance received as to overseas markets for local produce; (c) to furnish the local Government with such advice and reports as it may call for as to the possibility of improving and extending the export trade of the Colony, &c., and of developing local industries; (d) to reply to enquiries which may be addressed to them (1) by persons abroad desirious of obtaining produce from the Colony, &c.; (2) by local producers or traders desirous of finding markets abroad.
11. The attraction of capital for investment in Colonies and Protectorates still requires mention. That the resources of the British Empire should be developed is universally recognised to be desirable in the general' interest. To any particular Colony or Protectorate, moreover, assistance towards development should be beneficial, and indeed would be a valuable quid pro quo such as we' are instructed by our terms of reference to consider.
This object, we consider, can and should be promoted by attention being drawn, judiciously, though with emphasis, to the produce and natural resources of British Possessions. We would endorse in this connection the recommendations made in paragraphs 12 and 14 of the Report on Blue Book Reports of the Sub-Committee on Blue Books and Blue Book Reports
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Special attention should also be drawn to those industries or forms of agriculture which are of real importance to the progress or development of the territory which is being reported upon. For example, special atten- tion should be drawn to the sponge industry in the case of the Bahamas, and in the case of the Falkland Islands to the whaling industry, and it should be emphasised that the crews of the floating factories and whale catchers and the staff of the land stations are almost entirely foreign, and that the greater part of the capital employed in the industry is also foreign." "In making the above recommendations regarding future prospects of trade openings for capital and development generally, we are fully alive to the fact that, as these Reports are and will continue to be of a strictly official character, it is essential to avoid the inclusion in them of any matter which may lend itself to misunderstanding or misrepresentation in con- nection either with private enterprise or with the formation and operations of public companies. It is not necessary to write in a manner calculated to discourage enterprise, nor to withhold established facts calculated to promote enterprise, but it is essential to avoid publication under Government authority of expressions of opinion of a kind which might mislead the sanguine or give opportunity to the unscrupulous."
It is hoped that the same purpose will also be served by the dissemination of reliable information concerning local possibilities, such as will result from the publication of the Handbooks and the Trade Commissioners' reports. It is not within our province to consider the question of the display of local produce, whether by the Imperial Institute or by bodies such as the Malay States Information Agency. But we feel that such displays are unexceptionable and help towards the attainment of the same object.
12. Official and Parliamentary requirements have not yet been considered. These are at present met by the annual Blue Books, the Blue Book Reports, and the annual Colonial Administrative Reports. The first are dealt with in the Report on Blue Books of the Sub-Committee on Blue Books and Blue Book Reports, which forms Appendix I to our Report. We concur in the recommendations made by the Sub-Committee in that Report.
13. The Blue Book Reports and the Annual Colonial Administrative Reports have also been considered by this Sub-Committee, to which for this purpose Mr. W. C. Bottomley and our Secretary were added as additional members. report, with which we agree, forms Appendix II to our Report.
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