C.O.
220
[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Governinh0)
OPIUM.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[3835]
No. 1.
RECO Paul B 3
SECTION 1.
Colonial Office to Foreign Office(Received January 25.).
Downing Street, January 24, 1913.
Sir,
I AM directed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to transmit to you, with reference to letter to the Colonial Office of the 20th December, 1912, copy of certain papers on the subject of the regulation of the opium traffic.
I am, &c.
JOHN ANDERSON.
Enclosure I in No. 1.
Governor Sir F. May to Mr. Harcourt.
(Confidential.) Sir,
I HAVE the honour to transmit for your information the enclosed
Hong Kong, December 3, 1912. estimate made by Mr. R. O. Hutchison, Superintendent of Imports and Exports, of the copy of an revenue which might reasonably be derived from the letting of the Macao opium farm on a basis of the farmer being limited to the number of chests of opium per annum which this Government considers ample for legitimate requirements. I sent this estimate recently to the Governor of Macao for his own information, and when he visited me a few days ago, to return my official visit, I took the opportunity of discussing the estimate with him.
2. M. Sanches de Miranda told me that he had suggested that the farm, which expires in July 1913, should be put up to tender, with an annual limit of 560 chests of raw opium. He considered even that limit was somewhat small, and he expressed the opinion that the former estimate of this Government of 440 chests was much too small. He argued that the Hong Kong Government was influenced by advice of the Hong Kong farmer, whose object was to diminish the trade of the Macao opium farmer in order to increase his own trade.
3. I asked M. Sanches de Miranda to consider separately the amount which might reasonably be allotted in Macao to local consumption and to the export trade. After some argument, in which I referred him to the comparative population of Macao and Hong Kong and to the ascertained local consumption of the latter place, while he argued that local purchases in Macao were swelled by those of Chinese visitors, who took prepared opium away with them for their own use or for presents to their friends, he admitted that the estimate of local consumption at Macao was perhaps not very far out. He then proceeded to argue that the Macao farmer held the export trade; that it was very large, and that it was just this trade which the Hong Kong farmer wished to wrest from his rival in Macao. I admitted that formerly the Macao farmer had practically the monopoly of the export trade to the Chinese communities in Australia, in America, and elsewhere. But I reminded him that these markets were now closed; that the legitimate export trade must now be very small, and that the Hong Kong farmer would be limited in 1913-14 to a maximum of ten chests per mensem, and that before he could get a single chest for export he would have to satisfy this Government that the Government of the country of destination desired and permitted its import. I pointed out that in such circumstances it was unreasonable for the Macao farmer to allege that the Hong Kong farmer wished to kill his competitor's export trade.
4. M. Sanches de Miranda would not commit himself to any estimate of what the legitimate export trade in prepared opium from Macao might be. he had urged his Government not to extend the existing farm for another two years, as But he told me that recommended by certain Portuguese in Macao, in league, no doubt, with the opium farmer there. He informed me that he had been summoned to Lisbon by his Govern- ment to discuss important affairs, the nature of which was not disclosed. He thought the subject was the opium question, in which he, as a member of the recent Hague Convention, was well instructed. I thereupon urged M. Sanches de Miranda, who is,
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