98 



COFFEE. 



appears to have been in the year 1869-YO — ^the date of the ap- 

 pearance of coffee-leaf disease — but this export, 886,000 cwts., 

 was nearly equalled in 1874-75 with 874,000 cwts. In 1878-79 

 it was 775,000 cwts. The falling off in quantity has, however, 

 been more than made up in value, the customs return show- 

 ing 41,060,000 rupees worth exported last year against only 

 23,910,000 rupees in 1870, though perhaps the valuation in the 

 latter year was too low. The great decline has been in native 

 coffee, from 218,000 cwts., valued at 4,371,000 rupees, in 1868, to 

 49,284 cwts., worth 1,675,565 rupees, in 1879. If value as well as 

 quantity is taken into account, there can be no doubt that 1877 

 was the culminating year so far in the coffee trade of Ceylon, for 

 the 974,330 cwts. (we now speak of the calendar year) shipped 

 then was valued at close on fifty millions of rupees. . If any one 

 wishes to understand the cause of present depression iu business 

 throughout the island, they have only to remember that the defi- 

 ciency in hard cash to coffee planters as indicated by the ship- 

 ments of 1878 and 1879 cannot be less than twenty-six millions 

 of rupees, which would make an average of ten thousand rupees 

 per annum loss for every plantation in the country. I*fo wonder 

 that new products are required to turn the scale. Neverthe- 

 less the progress of the coffee-planting industry in Ceylon in 

 forty-three years is little less than marvellous : the export in 1837 

 being valued at a million of rupees ; that of 1879 at over forty 

 millions. The quinquennial record is as follows, showing a pro- 

 gressive increase up to 1871 when the Hemihia vastatrix began 

 to tell; after which year the average fell twenty per cent, to 

 1876, and it has continued to fall at this rate for the last three 

 years : 



For five years ending 1841 the average annual export was 54,873 cwts. 



" " 140,220 " 



" " 315,049 " 



" " 411,264 " 



" " 600,942 " 



" " 785,998 " 



" 973,975 " 



" " 799,115 " 



" " 761,365 " 



