[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.
OPIUM.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[28004]
No. 1.
1090
REC [June 14 JUL 13
SECTION 1.
23
(No. 233.) Sir,
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received June 19.)
Peking, June 5, 1913. IN my despatch No. 204 of the 14th May I had the honour to state that I was making further enquiry into the reason for the discrepancy between the amounts given as the average consumption of Indian opium during the four months January to April 1913 by the customs' returns and the foreign importers at Shanghai respectively. The former averaged approximately 1,400 chests a-month, whereas the latter was placed at from 1,100 to 1,200 chests.
In this connection I enclose copy of a despatch and enclosures from His Majesty's consul-general at Shanghai. It will be seen that the average clearances for consumption was 1,392 in Mr. Ezra's list from January to April. An attempt is made to explain the discrepancy between this figure and the number previously given (1,100-1,200) by the statement that about 400 chests were understood to be still in the hands of Chinese dealers and had not gone into consumption on the 30th April. Future clearances will be affected by this, but it should not have been taken into account in estimating the figures for January to April. As stated in my despatch No. 204 of the 14th May, the monthly average for this period amounted to about 1,400, or, according to Mr. Ezra's list, 1,392 chests.
In regard to the question of stocks, Mr. Ezra's list gives the stocks on hand on the 30th April as 25,410 chests, of which 18,316 were at Shanghai, 4,334 at Hong Kong, and 2,760 at Bombay. The number given as in bond at Shanghai, 17,711, agrees with the figure recorded by the customs on the same date.
Mr. Ezra has stated that in anticipation of the arrangement under the Malwa Combine coming into operation, the Chinese dealers effected heavy advances of their low-priced bargains. It would appear from this that the tendency of the Shanghai Opium Combine, to which reference was made in my despatch No. 216 of the 23rd May, has been to raise the Shanghai price of, at any rate, Malwa opium, which represented 59 per cent. of the stocks on the 30th April.
I have, &c.
Enclosure 1 in No. 1.
J. N. JORDAN.
(No. 70.) Sir,
Consul-General Fraser to Sir J. Jordan.
Shanghai, May 22, 1913. ON receipt of your despatch No. 48 of the 15th instant, I called upon Mr. Ezra for a report on the actual stocks of opium in Shanghai and Hong Kong on the 30th April, and for a return of clearances at both centres from the 1st January up to date.
These have now been received and are forwarded herewith. They show that during the four months 5,568 chests of both kinds, on an average of 1,392 chests per month, have actually been cleared, reducing the total stock for China to 25,410 chests.
In explanation of the discrepancy between the above average absorption and that shown by the customs returns, Mr. Ezra states that under the Malwa Combine, which became operative on the 1st April (whereas the Bengal Combine started on the 17th February), the native dealers are obliged to clear their contracts at the average price of their purchases, and so these dealers in anticipation of this stipulation effected heavy clearances of their low-priced bargains from the bonded godowns, and are understood still to hold about 400 out of possibly 800 chests thus cheaply obtained. As previously reported, the practice of the trade here allowed dealers to clear Malwa drug contracted
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