Directory_and_Chronicle_1936 — Page 870

KOWLOON FRONTIER DISTRICT OF

THE CHINESE MARITIME

CUSTOMS

This is the inclusive name given to the Chinese Maritime Customs stations adjacent to Hongkong and established in 1887 in accordance with the Chefoo Agreement of 1876 and its Additional Article of 1885 for the purpose of recording. the movement of opium and of collecting duty on the trade carried on by Chinese junks between Hongkong and Chinese ports. In 1899, when the New Territory was taken over by Hongkong, the Customs stations were removed from their former locations, which had been brought within the British boundary, and the present stations are situated at Taishan, Lintin, Shumchün, Shatowkok, Shaüchung, and Samun (Tooniang), besides which there are a number of frontier patrol posts on the north shores of Deep and Mirs Bays and between the two bays.

TRADE IN 1934

The following are the figures for the value of the direct foreign trade of Kowloon during the year under review, with comparative statistics for the preceding year: imports, 75.1 million dollars as against 96.6 million in 1933; exports, 5.5 million dollars as against 3.9 million dollars. Owing to its proxi- mity of Hongkong, Kowloon ranks in importance next to Shanghai and Tientsin. in regard to the volume of direct importations from abroad, and it might be thought that a decline amounting to 21.5 million dollars, or over 22 per cent., in the value of this section of the port's trade must have some serious com- mercial significance, yet it can be accounted for with something to spare simply by the fact that one commodity, rice, was imported in lesser quantity than in the previous year. Both crops in the area served by the port were good, particularly the second one, which was considered to be the finest for many years, and this circumstance, in combination with the extra taxation imposed on foreign rice by the provincial authorities, had the natural effect of curtailing. purchases from abroad. In consequence, only 2.7 million quintals valued at 27 million dollars entered the port as compared with 5.3 million quintals valued at 51.4 million dollars in the previous year, a net saving of 24.4 million dollars. There was a downward trend in the trade in other items besides rice, and one · of the most important of these items was kerosene, which registered a further decline in value amounting to 2.9 million dollars. The development of the kerosene-distilling industry in Kwangtung was commented upon at some length in the last report, This industry has now grown to such proportions, protected by provincial taxation as well as the high import tariff, that there is no longer any market for the imported article in the Liang Kwang provinces. The gradual strangulation of this trade is best illustrated by the following quan- titative statistics for importations at Kowloon during the past three years: 1932, 45.4 million litres; 1933, 19.7 million litres; and the year under review, 0.2 million litres. Extensive purchases of machinery for three of the new sugar refineries established by the provincial authorities of Kwangtung, and greater arrivals than usual of textile and various other classes of machinery, liquid fuel, and salt fish helped to offset some of the losses sustained by the import account. Exchange rates were favourable (in the immediate sense) to the import trade in that Canton silver currency (bank-notes continued to fall in value until May, but thereafter recovered to some extent) appreciated con- siderably vis-a-vis the Hongkong dollar, and the latter currency steadily

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