Directory_and_Chronicle_1908 — Page 797

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CHEFOO

cool winds and cold nights. Strong northerly gales are experienced in the late autumn and through the winter, and the roadstead gives but an uncomfortable, though safe, anchorage for steamers. In 1906, nearly two months were lost to trade through stress of weather and the entire mercantile community appreciates the necessity for proper harbour works, including a protecting breakwater and quay. Another pressing need is a good water supply. There is a good club, The races take place towards the end of September. Chefoo is two days' journey from Shanghai, and in the summer tourist tickets from Shanghai and return are issued by the Indo-China Steam Navigation Company, the China Merchants S. N. Company, the China Navigation Company and the Russian East Asiatic Steamship Company. Regular steamship communication with the port is also maintained by the Nippon Yusen Kaisha and the Osaka Shosen Kaisha. In 1876 the Chefoo Convention was concluded at Chefoo by the late Sir Thomas Wade and the former Viceroy of Chihli, Li Hung-chang. An enterprise has been recently established by a Wine Company of substantial standing; the soil of the locality lends itself to such an industry and the future success of the proprietors of the first Far Eastern wine growing concern is a matter of considerable interest. Chefoo is noted for its large and increasing fruit growing industry, supplying Shanghai, Vladivostock, Kobe and other Eastern ports with foreign fruits, which grow well with care and attention in that part of Shantung-the native fruit growers having received foreign instruction, so that which was at first a hobby is now a paying industry. Other very important industries are the manufacture of foreign silk and hand-made silk laces, which in the hands of foreigners promise to assume large proportions. Silk thread and silk twist are largely made and exported from here to France, Germany and America. Chefoo uses a large percentage of the cocoons from Corea and Manchuria which come to China. Chefoo was in 1900 connected by telegraph cables with Tientsin, Port Arthur, Weihaiwei, Tsingtau and Shanghai.

The trade of Chefoo, which is increasing, is principally in Beancake and Beans, of which large quantities are annually exported to the southern ports of China. In 1906 the net export of Beancake amounted to 1,144,814 piculs, as against 1,233,180 piculs in 1905, 1,117,658 in 1904, and 1,192,948 piculs in 1903. Silk, Strawbraid, Ground- nuts, and Vermicelli are the other chief exports. The import of Opium was 603 piculs of Indian brands, as no supplies came from Manchuria. The net value of the trade of the port for 1906, after deducting re-exports, was Tls. 34,710,267, as compared with Tls. 39,131,384 in 1905.

Chefoo is much in need of railway communication as well as improvements in the harbour, and both of these undertakings are under contemplation by Chinese capita- lists. These improvements, in the estimation of business men, will greatly develop the importance of Chefoo as a trade centre. An extensive work known as the Chefoo City Bund and Reclamation Scheme is expected to greatly improve the port, and if present intentions are fulfilled, the first model town under native jurisdiction will arise on the reclaimed land. Chefoo is an important port of call for large numbers of regular line and tramp steamers, being in the line communcation between Indian South China, Japanese, Corean and Manchurian ports and the ports north. During the season from March to December as many as thirty to forty steamers per day often enter and clear the port. The cable and telegraph offices with chambers for employes, are the most substantial and imposing buildings of the kind in China, excepting the Shanghai buildings. The port supplies Vladivostock and Siberia with upwards of one hundred thousand coolies annually; the coolies leave for Vladivostock during the spring months and those returning reach Chefoo in the latter part of the year. This movement of coolies furnishes business for numbers of steamers.

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