CO129-373 - Public Offices - 1910 — Page 382

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is 2 per cent. of last year's area. His campaign having taken place in the spring, the farmers were unable to put anything into the ground except potatoes and beans, of which there will this year no doubt be a record harvest. The old poppy fields are easily distinguished by the stray poppies showing here and there.

The Tao Chou district is too elevated for the opium poppy and is mainly inhabited by Thibetans, so that little opium has ever been grown there. I only saw one field which had not yet come into flower.

"In the Ti-tao and Ho Chou districts, the American missionary at the former town told me, the enforcement of the prohibition had been as strict as at Min Chou, very little opium being overlooked in either district. In former years these three were among the chief opium-producing districts of Kansu. In the two days crossing the Ti-tao district I saw not more than a dozen fields, though in many fields of beans and tobacco stray plants were carefully preserved.

"In Min Chou and Tao Chou the price of raw opium was from 900 to 1,000 cash an ounce. The sale was not officially licensed, but dens were supposed to have been closed. T'ai Chou being inhabited mainly by Mabommedans, the drug is not much smoked there; but in Min Chon and in the Chinese villages I was told the habit is universal, and the poorer members of the community are suffering severely from being unable to satisfy their craving.

"The remainder of my route has been traversed by Sir A. Hosie and reported ou by him. He will no doubt have noticed the large quantity of poppy growing in the Kao-lan Hsien district. I saw many times as much there as all I had seen previously put together.

"In the western part of Kao-lan Hsien district which I traversed the first day, I did not see any opium poppy, and I think it had all been cut down, the harvest being completed. Crossing the Yellow River at Hsin-ch'eng I followed the Si-ning River for the next two days as far as its junction with the Ta-tung River, up which I then went as far as Yao-kai. The whole of this journey was through the P'ing-fan district, which belongs to Liang-chou prefecture. In the lower parts the opium harvest was over, and the poppies had been cut down and removed, but the large stacks of poppy stalks in almost every courtyard were evidence that the plant had been extensively cultivated. Round Yao-kai I saw many fields-quite one-sixth of the irrigated land--covered with poppy in full bloom. The poppy, requiring a rich soil, is only cultivated here in the irrigated district, and therefore the total amount grown here cannot be very great. An intelligent Chinese I talked with on the subject told me that the proportion of puppy ground to other crops was in former years four-tenths of the irrigated land. The usual proclamation had been issued in Ping-fan but not enforced, and the bolder farmers had sown poppy and allowed it to remain when ordered to pull it up. He estimated the crop in Ping-fan district at one-tenth the normal, but I think this is an exceedingly low figure, and I should say a third of the normal amount would not be too large. The opium dealers were offering this year 300 to 400 cash per tacl for the new season's crops. This is about the same as last year's price, for the opium edicts had then already caused a great increase in the price of the drug. As the year advances the raw opium becomes dryer and more concentrated, so that for last season's opium the price is now 700 cash an ounce. The price of this year's opium is likely to rise to the same figure as it matures. The suppression of poppy cultivation appears to have been carried out very perfunctorily in the Ping-fan district and, I am told, throughout the Liang-chou prefecture. It is unfortunate I was not able to visit the latter city, but my previous arrangements did not allow it.

The campaign against the drug has been energetically proceeded with in the Si-ning prefecture, and cultivation almost entirely suppressed. Owing to the generally elevated and mountainous character of the country, the lowest parts being about 6,000 feet above sea level, the cultivation of the poppy is possible only in restricted districts along the river valleys, and even there was not as prevalent as in other parts of the province. The opium edicts already caused a reduction of the area under poppy in 1909, and this year the cultivation of the plant was completely stopped in the Si-ning district. In the Nien-pei and Ta-t'ung districts the prohibition was enforced with equal severity, although I saw an occasional field of poppy in the former, and I think the authorities throughout the Si-ning prefecture may be credited with carrying out the Imperial commands with exceptional thoroughness. The Kuei-te and Hsun-hua districts on the Yellow River, mainly inhabited by Thibetans, have never produced opium in considerable quantities. Dan-gar Ting is too elevated for its cultivation.

"In Si-ning the price of raw opium is now about 900 cash the ounce, that of prepared opium, 1,150 cash. Similar prices prevail at Ta-tung Hsien. An official

ago,

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bureau for the sale of opium and opium antidotes was opened at Si-ning some two years but has since been closed, and there is now no restriction on trade in the drug, nor are there any facilities for curing the opium habit. Opium dens have never existed in the city.

"The proportion of opium smokers among the Chinese population of the prefecture is estimated at over 50 per cent. The Mahommedans, Thibetans, and Mongols are not addicted to the habit, and not more than 1 per cent. of the former are thought to be opium smokers.'

As in the case of Shensi, the annual production of opium in Kansu previous to 1908 and since that year is an unknown quantity. There have been many estimates, the latest, and probably the most unreliable, based on Customs reports, being that presented to the Shanghai International Opium Commission, and given as 23,000 piculs for 1008. It was on this estimate that the production of Kansu in 1906 was arbitrarily increased to 34,000 piculs, although it is now well known that no measures of repression were introduced until 1909, and, indeed, no effective measures up to the present time.

In his telegraphic reply to the Wai-wu Pu, quoted in the "Peking Daily News" of the 7th September, the Viceroy of Shensi and Kansu states "that poppy was cultivated on a large scale in Kausu, and that there were numerous persons addicted to the opium-smoking habit. As the result of the crusade against opium last year, out of 168,500 mou of land in 1908, 77,300 were free from the poppy plant. At the begin- ing of this year only about 20,000 mou still remained under cultivation of the poppy. Commissioners were sent out to take concerted action with the local officials in persuading opium cultivators to turn their lands into grain fields, with the result that only about 2,000 mou of poppy fields have not as yet been totally converted. In the provincial capital there used to be six opium shops, but they have now been closed. In the 139 refuges, out of 234,600 opium smokers, 130,000 have been cured of the habit. This can have only one meaning, namely, that there were only 2,000 mou of land in Kansu under poppy in 1910, and all I can say is that in districts like Fo-chiang, Chin Hsien, or Ping-liang Hsien I passed in one day along the high-road hundreds of poppy fields, amounting in the aggregate to many thousands of mou. that the mou, fixed by treaty at 7334 square yards, varies in extent with the provinces, but no variation, however great, can justify the statement that the land under poppy cultivation in Kansu in 1910 amounted to only 2,000 mou, which, taking the Governor of Shansi's estimate of 40 Chinese ounces as the yield of opium per mou, would give the production of opium in Kausu for 1910 as 50 piculs !

It is true

Along the roads which I followed I observed few if any signs of interference with the poppy fields; in the Fochiang district there was an immense increase as compared with 1909, the Chin Hsien district was full of it, and the poppy was actually in full bloom within the walls of the city of Ping-liang Fu.

I am very much inclined to doubt any statements regarding poppy cultivation in China unless they are based on personal observation and investigation; but it is only fair that I should quote some notes on the subject which have been kindly furnished at my roquest by three missionaries in Kansu.

Mr. E. J. Mann, of the China Inland Mission, writing to me from Fo-chiang Hsien on the 5th July, says

On the afternoon you left this city (the 28th June) we had a terrible hailstorm, I hope you were not caught in it. I think it was more or less local. It seemed heaviest on the south bills where I told you so much opium was being grown. Quite a lot was badly injured. One plot of 40 shang ( 100 mou) was sold for 600 taels and was almost entirely destroyed. What was not destroyed is still a huge crop.

I don't know if

you were able to get a view of the poppy being grown on the north of the river. My inan reported that from the hill it looked one white flower-garden. And by all accounts there is a large crop being grown there. To the east of the city-15 li away-the ploughing craze did not affect the crop, and in one village there is reported to be only four plots of grain.

"There are still no merchants here and the price of raw opium is falling. At present it is 220 to 330 for different qualities. Small buyers are losing money fast, for all expected a quick rise in prices and many small merchants have invested their money in standing opium. I met the Roman Catholic priest recently and enquired of him as to opium in south of the province. He informed me that Huei Hsien and Cheng Hsien have very heavy crops, much more than other years. At Li Hsien, a city next south of us, the opium is more or less cleared from the plain around the city, but he says there is much being grown in the hills.

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