jardines
FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC RE W
October 31, 1963
HONGKONG
Page 299
277
GENERAL MANAGERS:
THE
SHIPPING DEPARTMENT
INDO-CHINA STEAM NAVIGATION CO., LTD. AGENTS: Glen Line Ltd. States Steamship Co. (States Line). Prince Line Ltd. The Clan Line Steamers Ltd. Furness Withy & Co., Ltd. & Associated Group. Royal Mail Lines Ltd. & Associated Group. Union Castle Mail Steamship Co., Ltd. Ampol Petroleum Ltd. B.P. Tanker Co., Ltd. Scottish Shire Line Ltd. And many others,
jardines
GENERAL
INSURANCE DEPARTMENT
MANAGERS: THE HONG KONG FIRE INSURANCE CO., LTD.
GENERAL AGENTS: LOMBARD INSURANCE CO., LTD. AGENTS: Alliance Assurance Co., Ltd., Atlas Assurance Co., Ltd., Bankers & Traders Insurance Co., Ltd., Economic Insurance Co., Ltd., Employers' Liability Assurance Corpn., Ltd., Merchants' Marine Insurance Co., Ltd., North British & Mercantile Insurance Co., Ltd., Queensland Insurance Co., Ltd., Legal Insurance Co., Ltd., Thistle Insurance Co., Ltd., Triton Insurance Co., Ltd.
Page 200 P344MATHESON & CO., LTD.
Jardine House, P.O. Box 70, Hong Kong
Winter Water
OF
ALL the difficulties that face Hongkong industry at present the most pressing is of course the shortage of water, which is unlikely to be alleviated in the coming winter. A statement of the Director of Public Works shows that he is budgeting for a shortfall up to the end of May of 2,300 million gallons, to be supplied by tankers bringing water from the Pearl River.
Daily consumption must come down from the present 35 million gallons to 30 million, if the Director's provisions are to be fulfilled. The onset of the cold weather should normally bring on a fall in domestic use; if not, even more drastic action will have to be taken than at present. But industry must be kept going at all costs.
The consumption of industry was very
roughly reckoned early this year at 9 million gallons daily, when overall con- sumption was around 60 million gallons. What it is now appears to be unknown, but it cannot presumably be much less. The problem industry from the water- consumption point of view is dyeing and finishing, the last to develop and most capital-intensive section of the Colony's textile industry, and in any case hardly adequate to the needs of the weaving and garment sections. A big dyeing and finishing plant may use up to 400,000 gallons a day. Some finishing plants are believed to have already reduced the num ber of operations by which their cloth is processed, with an inevitable fall in quality. Big dyeing and finishing works in the New Territories, which depend wholly or partly on private sources of
supply, are seeing these dry up, so they are likely to need special assistance during the winter.
Another big consumer is the soft drink bottling industry. This however reaches the peak of activity in the summer months; over the winter may have to face a reduction of the help it is at pre- sent receiving. The canning industry seems not to have suffered much; the biggest operator in this line has wells of its own. So do some of the big hotels, which are receiving no special allowance. Some rubber and metalware factories have been in trouble, but otherwise cases of hardship appear to be isolated-though no one is going out looking for cases to rectify. Hongkong's industrialists are clearly meeting the situation with their usual resourcefulness; their showing up to now gives every ground of thinking that somehow they will manage.
Recent visits by British politicians have reopened the debate about constitutional reform in Hongkong. Cheong-Leen, the well known businessman and Urban Councillor, today puts up some ideas on this topic.
Functional Democracy?
By Hilton Cheong-Leen
RECENTLY, President Sukarno sought to strengthen Ma- philindo ties by describing the Philippines as a Functional Democracy. His gratuitous statement boomeranged, and was immediately challenged by the Philippine Senator Raul Manglapaus as being derogatory to Filipino democracy.
This incident is symptomatic of what plagues the minds of many Asian politicians: how far should Asian countries go in accepting the traditions of individual liberty and the de- mocratic institutions of the liberal West, without disturbing national economic and social equilibrium.
This too is the concern of civic leaders in Hongkong who are equally conscious of the success of Hongkong's industrial revolution and of the latent need to adapt the city-state's archaic constitution to the age of the Common Man.
Hongkong has often been referred to as a "benevolent
Mr
dictatorship", where the Governor, assisted by a Civil Service that is dominated by expatriate administrators, rules supreme subject to whatever advice he accepts from the hand-picked Legislative and Executive Councils.
Only in the Urban Council, which is responsible for public health services and for resettlement management in the urban areas, is there a mild dose of democracy in practice. Of twenty-two Urban Councillors, six are Government officials, eight are individuals appointed by the Governor, and the re- maining eight are elected from a franchise of 24,000, com- prising mainly school-teachers, members of the Jury List, and Essential Services personnel.
The 500 senior British colonial servants who keep the wheels of Government turning int9e034bt de- dicated men. They in turn have the loyal cooperation and
278
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