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“...ports.. 54
Opening of new ports are an advantage to domestic trade .. .. .. 54
Permission to foreigners to hire warehouses in the interior.. .. 55
A greater boon to Japanese than to foreigners .. .. .. .. 55
Importation of machinery and erection of factories..' .. .. .. 55
Former prohibition intended to further private ends .. .. .. 55
Erection of foreign owned cotton mills .. .. .. .. .. 55
"Everything in their favour, but interested parties may prevent success .. 55
Question of excise on output of factories not settled.. .. .. .. 56
Japanese mills may undersell Chinese mills... .. .. .. 56
Number of mills and spindles in China .. .. .. .. 56
No trustworthy information regarding the working of Chinese factories .. 56
Proportion of hands and wages .. .. .. .. .. 57
Mill hand's efficiency .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 57
Effectof low-priced silver on Chinese manufactures .. >. .. 57
Silver not the only money of the Chinese .. .. .. .. ..57
The price of copper an important factor .....”
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“...time the Chinese Government has, when it suited it,
denied our right to manufacture at the open ports, and by way of
affirming its decision, orders had been given to the custom-house
not to pass the machinery necessary for the erection of cotton
mills at Shanghai. The reasons alleged was that machinery
would interfere with the means of livelihood of the people, the
real reason being that certain highly placed officials wished to .
retain the monopoly of cotton spinning and weaving. To
machinery in principle it is clear the Chinese Government had further
no objection, for at the very time that a factitious opposition was private ends,
being made to the importation of spindles and looms by foreigners
there were already at work in China steam mills for pressing
peas, match factories, silk-reeling establishments, machinery for
pressing brick tea, sugar factories, and other industries requiring
machinery. But these did not come into competition with
mandarin owned factories, and no question...”
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| 3 |
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“...-56
china.
Question of
excise on
output of
factories not
settled.
Japanese
mills may
undersell
Chinese.
Number of
mills in
China.
No trust-
worthy
information
respecting
working of
Chinese mills
obtainable.
this highly placed monopolist, may yet succeed by occult methods
in so handicapping foreign owned mills as to put them out of the
race. Discriminating duties on the raw material on the way to
the mills, and a preferential rate of excise on the output of the
mills, are weapons which Chinese officials are adepts at using, and
to defraud the public revenue in order to benefit individual enter-
prise is a device to which Chinese fiscal methods easily lend
themselves.
It is somewhat ominous that the question of excise, which all
who are interested in foreign owned manufactories in Shanghai
were hoping would be set at rest by the commercial treaty
recently ■■ concluded between China- and Japan, has been left
unsettled. The interpretation and amplification of the clause in
the Shimonoseki...”
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“...stock being left out of considera-
tion,. so that any estimate of profits would be misleading. We
shall have to wait until the foreign owned mills have been running
some time before auy trustworthy opinion can be pronounced.
As far as can be ascertained in the existing Chinese mills the Proportion of
proportion of workers in every 100 is 51 women, 24 men, and 25 hands and
children, and the average wages all round are 5 dol. (lis.) a wascs-
month. In Shanghai, owing to the increasing number of factories,
and the gradual rise in rents, and cost of living generally there is
a tendency for wages to rise. As to the efficiency of the labour Mill hands'
this will probably improve as time goes on. At present, so I was oD>clcnc.v-
informed by a foreigner in the best position to form an opinion,
the existing mills employ twice as many hands as similar mills in
England would require.
Much has been written to prove that the fall in the gold price Effect of lo«-
of silver must tend to encourage ma...”
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