Directory_and_Chronicle_1922 — Page 1076

HONGKONG

999

The imports from the U.S.A. were valued at £26,946,480 and the exports to that country at £17,086,023, both considerable increases over the previous year.

The total of the Shipping entering and clearing at ports in the Colony during the year 1920 amounted to 683,497 vessels of 40,122,527 tons, which, compared with the figures for 1919, shows an increase of 34,329 vessels and 4,507,358 tons. Of the foregoing, 43,364 vessels of 24,194,022 tons were engaged in foreign trade, as compared with 41,985 vessels of 21,072,129 tons in 1919. A comparison between the years 1919 and 1920 is given in the following table :-

1919.

Class of Vessels. No. Tonnage. British Ocean-going.. 3,865

Foreign

British River Steamers 5,502

""

Steamships under

Foreign

60 tons (Foreign

Trade)

1920.

Increase.

Decrease. No. Tonnage. No. Tonnage..

No. Tonnage.

6,842,024

5,274

7,625 823

3,253,781

4,173 8,351,084 308 1,509,060 5,418 9,223,552 144 1,597,729 5,138 3,256,985

3,204 364

1,599

591,679 1,741 577,270 142

14,409

5,035

161,689 5,028 167,248

5,559 7

Junks, Foreign Trade 20,710 2,597,133 21,866 2,617,883 1,156 20,750

Total, Foreign Trade.. 41,985 21,072,129 43,364 24,194,022 1,750 3,136,302 371

Steam

launches plying in Waters (586,18 of Colony

Junks, Local Trade...*20,995

Grand Total.

13,366,602 619,068 14,636,848 32,880 1,270,246

1,176,438 +21,065 1,291,657 70 115,219

.649,168 35,615,169 683,497 40,122,527 34,700 4,521,767 371

Net Increase..............34,329 4,507,358

14,409

14,409

The actual number of individual ocean-going vessels of European construction during 1920 was 927, of which 330 were British and 597 foreign. In 1919 the number was 957, of which 301 were British and 656 foreign. These 927 ships measured 2,522,888 tons. They entered 4,807 times and gave a collective tonnage of 8,801,620. Thus 30 more ships entered 232 more times, and gave a collective tonnage greater by 1,558,931 tons, an average of 67,195 tons per entry.

A Parliamentary paper issued in August, 1905, showed Hongkong to be, in respect of tonnage, the largest shipping port in the world. The trade chiefly consists of cotton, sugar, salt, flour, oil, cotton and woollen goods, cotton yarn, opium, matches, metals, earthenware, amber, ivory, sandalwood, betel, vegetables, granite, etc.

There is an extensive Chinese passenger trade, hiefly restricted, however, to the Straits Settle- ments, Netherlands India, Borneo, the Philippines, Siam, and Indo-China.

Hongkong possesses unrivalled steam communication. The P. & O. S. N. Co. and the M. M. Co. conveyed European mails weekly, and before the outbreak of the war, which eliminated German and Austrian shipping, the Norddeutscher Lloyd maintained a regular fortnightly mail service between Bremen and Hongkong. The China Mail S.S. Co., the Pacific Mail S. S. Co., the Toyo Kisen Kaisha and the Java Pacific Line maintain a service with San Francisco, and the Canadian Pacific Steamships, Ltd., maintain a regular mail service with Vancouver, B.C. The Bank Line, Ltd., and the Osaka Shosen Kaisha, run regular steamers to Victoria, Vancouver, Seattle and to Tacoma, and the Bank and Admiral lines maintain regular services to New York; the Australian Oriental Line keep up a regular monthly service with the Australian Colonies, and the Nippon Yusen Kaisha maintain services to Europe, Australia, and the United States (Seattle). In addition to all these, several great lines of merchant steamers run between ports in Great Britain and Hongkong, of which the China Mutual S. S. Co., Ocean $. S. Co. (Blue Funnel line), and the Glen, Bank, Mogul, Ben, Royal Mail, Shire, Barber, and Shell lines are the most conspicuous. A new service was instituted in 1921 between Lisbon and Hongkong by the Transportes Maritimos do Estado. Regular steam communication between Java and Hongkong is maintained by the Java-China- Japan Line and the Nederland Royal Mail Line. Between the ports on the east coast of China, Formosa and Hongkong the steamers of the Douglas S.S. Co. and the Osaka

* Including 11,486 Conservancy and Dust Boats of 758,624 tons.

19

11,156

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19

19

839,422