CO129-470 - Public Offices - 1921 — Page 122

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ANNEX 6.

Major E. Butterfield (Superintendent, Northern Shan States, Lashio) to the Financial Commissioner, Burma.

March 26, 1920.

I HAVE the honour to forward herewith a copy of my letter, dated the 12th March, 1920, regarding proposals for suppression of opium cultivation and opium traffic in the Northern Shan States.

This letter should have been addressed to you in the first instance, as I have only just become aware from perusal of a Government order circulated whilst I was still serving in the military police.

Superintendent, Northern Shan States, Lashio, to the Revenue Secretary to the Government of Burma, Rangoon.

March 12, 1920.

1. With reference to the suppression of opium cultivation and traffic in opium with China, I have the honour to invite a reference to paragraph 2 of letter dated the 19th of November, 1919. from yourself to the Financial Commissioner, Burma. A copy of the above paragraph was forwarded to this office by the Financial Commissioner, under his letter dated the 25th November, 1919, with reference to my predecessor's confidential letter, dated the 24th July, 1919.

This letter is written on the assumption that the views thus expressed by the Secretary of State are not meant to be regarded merely as pious opinions processes in a course of a treatment by which the opium suppression policy is meant to be ushered gently but firmly into its grave but that the words of the Secretary of State denote a live policy for the definite suppression of opium cultivation and traffic. and that it is our duty to take all practical measures as soon as possible for the execution of his policy.

Indeed, our engagements with China, such as article 11 of the convention, dated the 24th July, 1886, between Great Britain and China, have bound the Imperial honour and left no option but to carry out the suppression of opium traffic in the Shan States as well as in India.

The suppression of the traffic in India that is, the bulk of the traffic-leaves

us but a little way off our goal.

The conclusion of peace and the agreement obtained from the Sawbwas concerned to the suppression proposals detailed below have deprived us of all excuses for delay that we have hitherto made.

2. The above considerations are binding on us. But even apart from them I would urge that it is our moral duty to the primitive and unsophisticated races under our charge in these States (for it is no use trying to hide behind Sawbwas and a board of officials selected by us) to protect them from this, the most evil of all noxious national habits the opium habit.

So much do I feel this, as the result of personal observation and enquiry during the last two years and more, that I personally would ask to be removed from association with the Government of the Northern Shan States unless the matter were taken in hand.

I have not met a gazetted officer, or Shan, or Chinaman, or Palaung, or Kachin. in these States, whether he earned his living by opium cultivation or not, who does not freely admit that opium in itself is an evil thing; that it is unnecessary; that it is the moral and physical ruin of all who consume it; that the energy spent on producing it in the first instance goes into smoke; replaces food and life-giving crops, by one that is the direct cause of reduced life-energy in the individual, reduced capacity of the same area of soil to support population, and finally leads to crime, disease and death.

Moreover, it is more necessary to suppress opium cultivation here than it is in China, because there the people are to some extent inoculated by generations of use, and here they are only just beginning to cultivate on a large scale, which fact makes it easier to deal with the matter now.

America voluntarily suppressed alcohol, and Russia vodka and China onium. We are bound to suppress opium by treaty and by a greater moral responsibility to the inferior peoples we govern, and to avoid a greater barm,

3. My views are nct based on the Exeter Hall outlook on life, but on personal observations, and the unanimity of opinion of all who are in a position to know. The people most affected so far are the Kachins and cognate tribes. These, the race of greatest inherent possibilities in these States, if not in the whole province of Burina, a race that has peculiarly attracted every British officer who has had much to do with them, are being hastened towards destruction, under our Government, by opium and venereal diseases in these States.

Opium is now being grown in these States at elevations from 1.600 to over 7,000 feet, that is, it can be grown everywhere except on wet paddy land.

The harm is thus spreading towards the other races. Shans are now taking up the lowland cultivation of opium in place of food crops.

As an instance of what opium can do, I may mention the case of the Chinaman, Law Leo, probably the most useful member of his race to Government in the States. When I first came to Lashio he did not use opium. The high price and immense profits then attracted him to trade it, and he began to be a consumer himself. He was then our chief mule and other contractor, whose word was as good as any other man's bond, a man of unusual bodily and mental vigour. His character changed, he broke his contracts and in two years he was dead. the civil surgeon certifying the cause of death to be excessive opium consumption.

Quite apart from our duty to China, therefore, I urge it is our duty to our subject races to suppress opium cultivation and traffic in these States to the point of extinction.

4. I may add that nothing will so tend to reduce the cost of living in these States as turning the energy spent in making the most expensive of all smoke into the production of foodstuffs and clothing material again.

It will also result in the reduction of crime, of the incentive for collection of Idacoit bands on our borders, which annually cost Government and traders so much,

and the health and work energy of the people will be increased.

5. A great feature in the last two years has been the number of Chinamen that have come to these States, snatching the opium crop and then frequently absconding without paying their taxes. They have mainly cut down new forest in the hills and cultivated taungya opium, with its resulting extensive destruction by fire of adjacent forest. a process repeated each year.

The forests in the eastern States are being so denuded, that east of a line Lashio to Namhkam, it is doubtful whether there exists a square mile of continuous virgin forest in any one place. The great increase of population that is going on and the failure hitherto to find a substitute for, or modification of, taungya cultivation in the hills has made forest preservation the most vital necessity in these States, next to opium suppression. This necessity is not confined to the local needs in fuel, preservation of valuable building timbers and other forest revenues. but also for protection of irrigation and drinking water-supply and soil fertility.

Neither are these matters merely local in application, The Burma Mines Com- pany electric water-power works and the Kyaukse District irrigation system depend on the water-supply from these States. Further development of mining wealth so Fremarkably abundant in these States will depend largely on the available wood and

water-supply.

What happens to the forest and water-supply where opium cultivation is generally permitted may be gauged from the State of Kokang, the trans-Salween portion of the North Hsenwi State. Here the population is almost solid Chinese, and the main occupation of the people opium cultivation.

The country is an eyesore to lork at for lack of trees. The soil is the most unfertile in the States. Walls are made of stone, houses of stone or mud-bricks, fuel is largely cow or pig dung, that should have been available as manure. In many places the people and all animals have to drink out of the same stinking green pool. The population is scanty, rice is 16 and sometimes 20 rupees a basket, and all other necessaries of life on the same scale. Only Chinese can survive.

This is what comes from opium cultivation. The best way to preserve our forests, as an initial step, is to stop opium cultivation. This will restrict taungya cultivation and influx of Chinese for that purpose to a great extent. Thus the two main necessities or reforms required in these States, opium suppression and forest preservation, are intimately connected, and Government has committed itself to the furtherance of both policies, on information, perhaps, that did not include all the important considerations above.

6. The following is an outline of the practical measures I propose to suppress

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