164 FOREIGN COCONUT ENTERPRISE 



merchants are now embarking on the cultivation 

 of the coconut and the acquisition of large areas 

 suitable for this profitable branch of tropical 

 agriculture. Quite recently we heard from Mr. 

 Abraham Sol, a former Resident Provincial Governor 

 of the East Indies, who is now in the Middle East, 

 that certain Chinese merchants have started 

 planting in Sumatra some 4,000,000 trees. Other 

 properties are being acquired in various parts of 

 the Middle East by Chinese capitalists convinced 

 that this industry has a brilliant future. 



The Americans, owing to the scarcity of animal 

 fats referred to in Chapter I., are now turning 

 their special attention to the coconut, and their 

 consumption aggregates about 50,000,000 nuts per 

 annum, quite apart from the copra imported, 

 which amounted, in 1912, to 46,370,732 lb., 

 valued at $3,851,279. They also have an immense 

 area of territory which produces the coconut. 

 Florida and Cuba yield a fair quantity ; the 

 Philippines, their largest overseas possession, is 

 one of the most prolific coconut- growing regions in 

 the world, and most of that island's production is 

 exported to America. The New York merchants 

 also import immense quantities of coconuts from 

 Brazil, Panama, and also the West Indies, the 

 prices obtainable by the coconut planters of 

 Trinidad, Jamaica, and other West Indian centres 

 being so high that the greater part of their nuts 



