CO129-482 - Public Offices - 1923 — Page 460

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tions for the Sale and Manufacture of Medicinal Opium, which wore framed on these principles were issued in August, 1878, and brought into operation in the May fol- lowing. Under those regulations the home-made article has been purchased by the Home Department and, together with the foreign article, examined for its quality by the same Department and thereafter sold to specially designated druggists through medicine superintendence offices and other offices under the jurisdiction of that Department. Further, although with a view to increasing the material for medicinal opium, the Government had, as above stated, encouraged the cultivation of the poppy and established the system of purchasing manufactured opium, the results were for a long time unpromising; the annual production of the country with the Osaka district as its center was only about two hundred pounds. Since the outbreak of the great European War in 1914, however, simultaneously with the general encouragement of medicine-manufacture and cul- tivation of medicinal plants, the rate of compensation with respect to poppy cultivation and opium manufacture was raised, and lectures were given on the methods of cul- tivation and manufacture, with the result that the annual production gradually rose and stands now at about 8000 pounds,

The Regulations for the sale and Manufacture of Opium of 1878 were replaced in 1897 by the Opium Law which is still in force; there is no difference between them with respect to the principal points in the control of opium; thus, opium is a Government monopoly, private im- portation is prohibited, and all home-made opium is made over to the Government, and no person is permitted to sell buy, transfer, own, or possess, any opium other than that sold by the Government, With regard to the control of Opium in Japan, we may add that by strict control of opium by national prohibition at a time prior to the Restoration when the people were still ignorant of the nature of opium, we have fortunately been able to escape the instilment of opium poison from which some of the neighbouring states are suffering.

Thus, no evils whatever had long time risen in connection with the control of opiwn; but during the Euro- pean War some unscrupulous persons plotted secret exporta- tion of opium; and as it was feared that such practices would raise its market price and prove an obstacle to med- ical treatment, amendments were made in 1917 and 1919 to the Opium Law, whereby the control of opium-manufacturer was made stricter, the distribution of dealers in medicinal