CO885-11 — Page 657

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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :---

C.O.882/11

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

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Britain are parties, bind the signatories not to permit the export of opium from countries into which it is imported for smoking purposes (your Confidential despatches to me, dated 14th September* and 17th October, 1927†).

3. Before going further I venture to remind you that I do not come to the examination of the opium problem in China as a novice, for I attended the original International Opium Conference at Shanghai in February, 1909, as the Hong Kong delegate, and both before and since then I have made a special study of this subject, concerning which I have written several monographs, for example, a memorandum on an examination of the Hong Kong opium farmers' books in May, 1908; a calcula- tion of the percentages of opium-smokers in China, Ssu-ch'uan, and Hong Kong: a calculation of the greatest possible consumption of morphine by opium-smokers; an article on the poppy from the Chinese Compendium of Literature and Illustrations, ancient and modern; a memorandum on attempts made by the Canton Government to impose additional taxation on foreign opium (1910). Copies of all these prints are at the Colonial Office. I much regret, however, that pressure of other anxieties since my return to Hong Kong has prevented me from laying my views on this subject before you at an earlier date, and I am now writing this despatch with a view to repairing my omission.

4. Since assuming duty as Governor, I have been profoundly concerned to see You will the recent rapid deterioration of the whole opium situation in China. remember that the first resolution passed at the International Opium Conference at Shanghai recognized the unswerving sincerity of the Government of China in their efforts to eradicate the production and consumption of opium throughout the Empire.' The course of events has completely stultified this resolution. There is to-day no "Government of China "; and the various regional authorities which exist are chiefly concerned to make, each and all, as much revenue as they can out of the production and consumption of opium. For example, a note from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs to His Majesty's Embassy at Paris, dated 2nd April, 1927, a copy of which was sent to me in your Confidential despatch of the 10th May, 1927,‡ says:-" La culture du pavot est devenue plus florissante que jamais dans certaines provinces du sud est de la Chine dont l'excedent de production est ecoule vers les pays consom- mateurs. Il est en particulier avere que les ports chinois de Tongking et de Pakhoi, qui sont à proximité de la frontière tonkinoise, constituent les deux principaux centres de transit de l'opium du Yunnan et du Kouangsi. La drogue y est embarqée sur des jonques qui rejoignent au large les vapeurs se rendant à Hongkong ou vers d'autres destinations. I refer you also to the despatch No. 117 of the 8th October, 1927, written by Mr. J. F. Brenan, His Majesty's Consul-General at Canton, to the Foreign Office, reporting that opium is a government monopoly in the Kuangtung province, that revenue is collected through an organization called the Opium Suppression Bureau," and that opium itself is referred to in the Cantonese official documents as anti-opium medicine." Nor does the barefaced hyprocrisy end here. From the enclosures in Mr. Brenan's despatch it appears that the raw material for Canton is obtained from the provinces of Yunan and Kweichow, and that the transportation of raw material has been farmed out by the Canton Bureau to Chinese merchants, viz., the Hing Wan Company. As regards the conditions in Shanghai, the most recent report I have seen is Sir S. Barton's Confidential despatch No. 88 of the 1st December, 1927, to His Majesty's Minister at Peking, from which it is clear that the thirst for money is the chief incentive of the regional authorities in the Kiangsu and Chekiang provinces, and that they are determined to make the most of so profitable a source of revenue. For particulars of the flagrant trade in opium now going on at Hankow I refer you to the enclosures in your Confidential despatch of the 10th December, 1927.§

•

*

5. Now in this matter, as in so many others, it is important to remember that geographically speaking Hong Kong is a part of Kuangtung. Hong Kong is a small British Colony with less than one million inhabitants, situated on the sea coast of a large Chinese province which is estimated to contain thirty-seven million inhabitants. The Kuangtung province is somewhat smaller than Italy in area, but has a somewhat larger population: whereas the total population of the whole of this Colony is less than that of a single town in the Kuangtung province, I mean its capital, Canton. Moreover, there is in normal times a daily ebb and flow of many thousands of Chinese, among whom are probably hundreds of opium addicts, between Hong Kong and Canton, while in abnormal times there is a sauve qui peut from Canton to Hong Kong,

* C. 30049 27 [No. 74]: not printed.

‡ C. 30033/27 [No. 4]: not printed.

+ C. 30049/27 [No. 87]: not printed.

§ C. 30194/27 [No. 7]; not printed.

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which may add (as recently happened) some twenty thousand souls to the Colony's population in a couple of weeks. Under such conditions it is quite impossible for Hong Kong to suppress, or even to effect considerable reduction in the consumption of opium by its inhabitants, while the Canton authorities encourage both the production and the consumption of opium and take no steps whatever to check the export of prepared and raw opium from Kuangtung into this Colony. All that is practicable in Hong Kong, until the production and consumption of opium in China are effectively controlled with a view to eventual suppression, is to keep the price high enough to make opium a luxury and yet not so high as further to encourage smuggling.

6. Another important factor in the local situation is the opium policy of the Government of India. In a letter, dated the 14th June, 1926, this Government was informed by the Finance Department (Central Revenues), Simla, that the Government of India, in order to fulfil, in the fullest possible measure, both in letter and in spirit, the international engagements into which they have entered in regard to the suppression of the illicit traffic in opium, and to render such assistance as lies in their power in the solution of the problems connected with the use of prepared opium in the further East, " had announced their decision to reduce progressively exports of opium from India, except for strictly medical and scientific purposes, so as to extin- quish them altogether in ten years: that after the year 1935 no further exports would be made except for strictly medical and scientific purposes; and that the Hong Kong alotment would be as follows:-

Year Chests

1927. 1928. 1929, 1930. 1931. 1932, 1933. 1934. 1935. 220 196 171 147 122 98 73 40 24

If India were the sole course of the world's opium supply, it is plain that the policy thus adopted by the Government of India would not merely have solved the Indian opium problem, but also that of Hong Kong. As, however, India is not the sole source, I am tempted to ask whether her action in reducing and eventually discon- tinuing supplies, without assuring herself that other sources would be available to British Colonial Governments, who are required to continue the fight for suppression, and would be denied to private interests, which are concerned to stand in the way, was really best calculated to render such assistance as lay in her power in the solution of the problems connected with the use of prepared opium in the further East. Never- theless, I freely admit that India has set a fine example both to Persia and to China. My only fear is that, perhaps Persia, and certainly China, will not follow suit for many years to come.

7. In connexion with the decision taken by the Government of India you notified me in your Confidential despatch of the 25th January, 1926.* that the Hong Kong Government would be at liberty, if the necessity should arise, to supplement restricted supplies from India by drawing from other sources such opium as it might require during the transitional period, so far as this might be consistent with the international stipulations, to which the Hong Kong Government had already agreed, and with the laws of the Colony and the laws of the country from which supplies may be drawn. I noted the authority so conveyed to me with much relief, and it encouraged me in the line of action which I eventually decided to adopt.

8.

On taking stock of the situation in Hong Kong itself, I found that opium, raw and prepared, was being seized constantly on every ship plying between this port and China. I append, as a typical example, the record for a few months of a single river steamer, the s.s. Tai Hing, running between Hong Kong and Wuchow on the West River. I found the Colony's prisons to be seriously congested, and I ascer- tained that in recent years one-third of the inmates were serving sentences for smoking or trafficking in illicit opium. The figures are as follows:-

Year.

1924

1925

1926

1927

Total number of Number of prisoners convicted

under the Opium Ordinance.

prisoners.

7,382

6,339

6,511

7,740

2,457

2,932

2,595

3,044

I turned to the record of official sales of opium and found that they had been falling, and falling quickly, for a considerable time, and that the weekly average was little

* No. 112.