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obliged to sell raw opium at 50 cents an ounce, and this with a land tax varying from $6 to $12 a man leaves such little profit that with the high cost of food the planter labours in vain. It does not pay to extensively grow opium under conditions at present prevailing in the southern provinces. Drought was experienced last in the South and West. This affected the opium crop, and also the cereals with the result food soared to unknown prices and the people again starved. Two such seasons have taught the people that more food must be raised, but reports say that with a good harvest the farmers will again turn to opium planting provided a market can be found.
year
When it is stated that compulsory cultivation has been less this season, what is meant is that direct military force has been It less apparent, farmers have not been shot as in 1924-5 season. does not mean that the people have been free from intimidation by local civil or military authorities. Fukien province as in previous years has had every for of compulsion from mild to military. The mild form in all provinces is that of the increase of land tax, which rises year by year and even at different parts of the same season and also the collection of land taxes several years in advance. Where big profits can be made out of opium in provinces on or near the sea or with good means of transport, land taxes have risen to such heights that only opium cultivation can meet them. In Kweichow and Szechuan with the big river offering transport to unlimited quantities of opium a so-called "lazy tax" has been instituted in many districts. This means that those refusing to grow opium are termed lazy and have to pay the same tax on their land as the poppy cultivators.
Fukien presents this year a new form of opium monoply enterprise. In many places both military and naval authorities have "farmed" out the monopoly to individuals or trusts who pay down a lump sum for the privilege and are supported by the military authorities in getting back their own and more from the land and other taxes.
The Naval Authorities which have to support their fleets as the militarists do their armies have developed large opium transactions during the year. Not content with forcing opium cultivation along the coastal fisiens of Fukien, they have become big transporters of Yunnan opium to Shanghai, Tsingtao and Ningpo. A recent instance of a cargo of opium valued at $100,000 from Yunnan was intercepted by a naval cruiser in the Hainan Straits. The opium was taken on board the cruiser, and proceeded to a destination unknown, the steamer being under the impression that the opium had been seized as contraband.
Similarly a few months earlier 300 cases of Yunnan opium were taken on board another coastal stoainer, with instructions that a day's steaming from Shanghai, they would be met by a Chinese cruiser to which they were to transfer the opium. They did so, but some days after it was discovered by the opium ring that the cruiser which had relieved them of this costly consignment was not the one controlled by the military section for whom they were working, and hence the opium was a total loss. Some one had evidently given away the
secret.
In May 1925 the Shanghai press revealed the importation by the Army and Navy of 500 chests of opium during the previous week. Another report states that 200 cases were landed near the Arsenal
3
and it was estimated that 4,000 chests of various kinds of opium were waiting suitable opportunity for landing. Opium combines are very much annoyed with the Army and Navy encroachments. Some of this opium is of foreign origin, but the bulk of it is from southern provinces.
The largest foreign opium deal during 1925 is referred to under the heading of Shanghai. It involved $1,296,000 worth of opium exported from Constantinople to Vladivostok. It failed to reach the latter port, because it was discharged from the Japanese steamer outside Shanghai under orders of a Chinese group not associated with the foreign combine.
I.
CHINA'S OPIUM CONDITION SUMMARISED
From the provincial reports China's opium condition in 1925 may be summed up as follows: -
Production limited only by the inclinations of the people on the one hand, and the varying degrees of military and civil compulsion on the other.
2.
4.
Absolutely no restrictions imposed on any branch of the traffic except by a few magistrates here and there and in the two pro- vinces mentioned.
3. Every transaction in opium has been taxed to its breaking point.
Public opium smoking on steamers, in trains, military and civil yumens, restaurants and country inns is more in evidence than in any year since national prohibition was declared.
5.
If 1925 produced less opium than 1924 or previous years, it was entirely due to previous "glut", and higher price of food.
OPIUM AND NARCOTICS CONFISCATED BY MARITIME AND NATIVE CUSTOMS DURING 1925.
Native opium
Foreign opium
Opium dross
Poppy seeds
Morphia
Cocaine, Heroin
FOREIGN OPIUM SEIZED
45.989 lbs.
2,879 lbs.
800 075.
181 lbs.
12,288 ozs.
6,128 ozs.
Whilst a small amount of Indian opium may be smuggled into China from some of the Eastern Monopoly States the bulk of the seizures are of Persian and Turkish opium. It must be recognized that only about 14 tons was seized in 1925 which is a very great reduction on previous years when it was nearly to tons.
Persia and Turkey have hithertoo had free trade in opium. The League of Nations Secretary General reports that Persian opium exports had increased in 1924 to £1,246,000 of which £846,000 worth was exported to Vladivostok. Persian exports to Vladivostok have increased from 12 to 41 per cent of their total export. In 1925, 460 tons of
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