CO129-340 - Governor Nathan Acting Governor May - 1907 [4-6] — Page 363

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losure !.

boiled in China.

5.

Nevertheless it is open to the

Opium Farmer in this Colony to export prepared Opium to

359

China if he is able to produce the drug sufficiently cheap-

-ly, and it is conceivable that after securing a profit on

his undertaking by sales in Hongkong at the high prices

his monopoly enables him to command, he might put his

surplus produce on the market in China at rates that would

enable it to compete with the native prepared drug.

The prohibition, therefore, would

entail a curtailment of the rights of the Opium Farmer

under the existing grant made for a period of three years

from the lat. March last copy of which is enclosed, and

}

might actually diminish his legitimate business under the

grant. The prohibition could not, therefore, be imposed

without exposing this Government to a claim for compensa-

-tion on the part of the Farmer.

6.

In order to avoid any such claim

and to obtain the consent of the Opium Farmer to the

legislation necessary to impose the prohibition, I have to

suggest that the Chinese Government should undertake on its

part to prohibit the exportation of prepared Opium from

China