CHAPTEE VIII 



THE COCOANUT-PLANTING INDUSTEY 



About two-thirds of the copra exported from 

 QueHmane, the chief copra-producing district of 

 the Province, is from trees owned by natives or 

 planted by them and purchased by the Prazo 

 companies, some of whom have embarked in 

 extensive planting, though very little of the new 

 planting has as yet come into bearing. 



There being no reliable records from which to 

 quote, the only way of arriving at the number 

 of bearing cocoanut-trees in the district of 

 Quelimane is to calculate it from the yield of 

 copra. It becomes necessary, therefore, first 

 to determine the yield of nuts per tree, but for 

 this also there are no proper records. Yields of 

 forty or fifty nuts per tree are given, but these 

 yields are based on what the bearing trees only 

 yield, unproductive trees being left out of account. 

 There is a natural desire on the part of the owners 

 to make their plantations appear in as favourable 



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