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JAPAN
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foreigners, and formed in connection with the Standard Oil Company with that end in view. Capital was to a small extent furnished by Japanese, though most of the shares were held by foreigners. The total capital was £1,020,833, and there were 100,000 shares of £10 4s. 2d. each. 3,500 tons of plant had arrived from the United States in 1900. A large syndicate of Japanese was rumoured to have acquired the right to work other extensive oil-fields in Echigo, and proposed entering into competition in the kerosene market. Foreign capitalists were reported also to have turned their attention to the gold-fields discovered in the Hakkaido in 1899.
Certain classes of goods are now exempt from import duty when imported for the purpose of improvement, provided that they are re-exported within one full year from the date of their importation. The law by which provision is made for such exemption, issued in pursuance of a vote passed by the Diet in its 14th Session (December 8, 1899, House of Representatives), was published on August 21, 1900. The idea is said to be to import, for example, plates from France and have them decorated so as to resemble Kutani ware, and watches from the United States to be enamelled at Nagoya and re-exported. The Japanese railway companies with few exceptions have discarded American locomotives in favour of those of British manufacture, merely using up but not replenishing their stock of the former, as they have experienced so much trouble from their boilers. It is only by one or two of the smaller railway companies and the Hokkaido Railway that orders for locomotives are still placed in the United States, and for two reasons, cheapness and despatch. For example, specifications were recently issued for locomotives for the Hokkaido Railway, for which British manufacturers were allowed to tender, but both the limit of time and the price obtainable were insuperable obstacles to the order being given to the United Kingdom. During 1900, 30 locomotives were ordered from British factories, an order for 24 of them, valued at £66,000, being placed in November. Two of the four sleeping-cars which are in use on the Government railway came from England and two from the United States. The formerare found to bemuch better, and to give greater satisfaction. While it is probable that those required for future use will be constructed in Japan, the United Kingdom will benefit by supplying the fittings, such as wheels, sole bars, buffers, and springs, which are not made in Japan. The Formo- san Railway in 1899 ordered six locomotives from the United Kingdom to be delivered at Kelung, and steel and other materials for bridge-making. To save duty the bridges are made at Osaka, and thence sent on to the island. The geographical situation of the United States with regard to Japan and the eagerness with which American manufacturers are seeking a market in that country will make her a competitor more and more formidable as time goes on. While the complaint constantly heard is that English manufacturers have more work on hand than they can conveniently deal with, the Americans would appear to have no hesitation in extending their establishments and enlarging their staff of workmen regardless of the possibility of bad times. The share they have acquired of the trade with Japan is, it would seem, a justification of their sanguineness, as far as this country is concerned. In 1900 Americans again secured a number of valuable contracts for the delivery of goods in 1901, including one. for rails which was estimated at £72,000. Among the reasons for the very large figures to which the import trade from the United States into Japan rose in 1900 was the fact that the extensive orders, the execution of which was undertaken there in the preceding year, included 20,000 tons of rails, which at the high price then prevailing would account for, say, £160,000. A large quantity of electrical machinery for tram-lines and electric lighting and bridge work, and wire, as well as flour, are also included in the returns. Telephone cable was at one time a United States monopoly, but now German makers are fulfilling large orders for it. British manufacturers, owing to the high prices asked for, have so far been unsuccessful in obtaining any contracts for this material.
The most
Extension of the Japanese railway system goes on uninterruptedly. recent returns give the length of the railway lines as 3,635 miles, 833 miles of Govern- ment and 2,803 miles of private railway, on March 31, 1900. This makes an increase of 65 miles of Government and 150 miles of private railway since April 1, 1899, a length of 215 miles in all. The principal private lines are the Nippon Railway, mileage 857 miles ;
Kiushiu Railway, mileage 330 miles; Sanyo Railway, mileage 280 miles; Hok- kaido Tanko Railway, mileage 207 miles. A Private Railway Law and Railway Busi- ness Law were promulgated on March 15, 1900, for the better exercise of control over the construction of railways and matters connected with railway work in general, which came into force on October 1, 1909. Sleeping-cars were brought into use on the Tokaido line from the same date.
By treaties made with a number of foreign Governments the Japanese ports of Kanagawa (Yokohama), Nagasaki, Kobe, Hakodate, Niigata, and the cities of Tokyo
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