COPPER. 97 



In 1908, in a manuscript report to the Government of India, 

 while reserving the right to express a final opinion when I was 

 better acquainted with the iron ore deposits of Yunnan, than I 

 was at that time, I was inclined to believe that the French writers 

 were, quite naturally, more desirous of seeing the deposits of Tong- 

 king opened up than of advocating the introduction of capital 

 across their frontier. A more extended knowledge of Yunnan and 

 its minerals has led me to the later conclusion that in discouraging 

 the expansion of iron and steel metallurgy in Yunnan on European 

 lines, these writers were reasoning on Sound economic lines. 

 There are no iron ore deposits that I am aware of in Yunnan 

 at all comparable in extent with those of the old crystalline rocks 

 of India and Indo-China and as the local demand is a small one, 

 and not likely to increase very greatly, such an industry would 

 have to depend for its success on trans-frontier trade. The land- 

 locked position of the province makes freight charges so high that 

 even with railway transport available say to Tongking, to the 

 Yangtze valley and to Burma, the local products would find it 

 next to impossible to compete with French, Chinese or Indian 

 manufactures in these countries or with European and American 

 iron landed on their coasts. 



That a modern blast furnace plant can be worked successfully 

 in China is of course proved by the Han-kow works, but a situa- 

 tion such as they enjoy does not exist in Yunnan. 



At the same time there is very considerable room for improve- 

 ment in the local industry, but I am persuaded that this is a matter 

 which may be left with advantage to the small Chinese capitalist. 

 Future progress in the way of more systematic mining, more profit- 

 able utilisation of the ores and the closer association of the smelters 

 with the coalfields of the province, if they come about at all, will 

 probably come through him. 



COPPER. 



Copper is said to have been smelted in Yunnan for at least a 

 thousand years and the province is supposed to have supplied the 

 greater part of the metal used in the coinage of copper cash through- 

 out the country. For this reason a Government department has 

 controlled all operations in the mining, smelting and trading of 

 copper for hundreds of years. Under the Manchu dynasty all 

 the mines were regulated by the authorities who granted licenses 



