April, 1910.] 



319 



Edible Products. 



average consumption of rice per man, 

 woman, and child, and these figures 

 applied to the Korean population place 

 the approximate rice production of 

 Korea for home consumption at con- 

 siderably more than 3,200,000,000 pounds, 

 or, roundly, 50,000,000 bushels. To be 

 added to this in estimating the yield are 

 the 100,000,000 pounds, approximately, of 

 native rice annually exported for the 

 last six years, thus bringing the total 

 production up to 3,300,000,000 pounds. 

 Although these figures are approximate 

 they give a fair idea of the probable rice 

 production of Korea. The American 

 rice crop amounted to 377,971,917 pounds 

 in 1905, valued at $12,955,748. 



Methods op Measurement. 



It is, however, much more difficult to 

 ascertain the rice productive area of 

 Korea. Different measures of capacity 

 obtain in the majority of the provinces, 

 and the Korean farmers measure their 

 fields by so many days' " ploughing," or 

 the area covered by a man, an ox, and a 

 wooden plough during one day's work. 

 Naturally a day's " ploughing " differs in 

 extent from one end of the Empire to the 

 other. Not only are the farms measured 

 by the "one day's ploughing" system, 

 but the Koreans also have heretofore 

 sold and transferred land on the basis of 

 the average amount of ground sown by 

 a certain measure. Thus, "one mal 

 (measure) land " is that which can be 

 sown with one such measure of rice seed 

 and "two mal land "is twice as much. 

 Thus it will be seen that rice has not 

 only usually headed the Korean export 

 list, but also established the custom for 

 real estate transactions. Elsewhere in 

 the Far East the influence of rice is 

 greater, if anything, than in Korea, for 

 speculation on the rice exchanges, when 

 the Government does not stop it, con- 

 stantly changes the price of the staple 

 and affects the entire population. In 

 the olden days the Japanese officials 

 were paid in rice in many instances. 



In Korea approximate calculations 

 place the production of an acre of good 

 rice ground under favourable conditions 

 at about 1,700 pounds of the cereal. 

 From these figures it is possible to con- 

 servatively place the approximate rice 

 productive area of Korea at 2,941*17 

 square miles, or a little over 3i per cent, 

 of the total area. 



Acreage Yield in Korea, Japan, 

 and America. 



In view of the fact that the Japanese 

 department of commerce and labour 

 places the average rice yield in Japan 

 during the past ten years at 14,148,514,373 

 pounds and the average imports and 



exports for a like period at 723,274,903 

 and 132,832,207 pounds, respectively, the 

 following approximate figures convey an 

 idea of Korea's yield as compared with 

 the area in square miles under culti- 

 vation in that country and Japan and 

 the United States :— 



Area, square. Percent. Yield in 



miles. of territory. Pounds. 



Japan .. 11,093-64 7 516 14,7S7,?97,732 



Korea ... 941-17 3'6 :-t,2C 0,000,000 



United States ... 1,699-48 -056 377,971,917 



The figures for Japan include the yield 

 in Formosa for 1906. Those for the 

 United States are for 19 a 5 and do not 

 include Alaska or insular possessions. 

 The approximate average yield per acre 

 is estimated as follows : Japan, 1,915'S 

 pounds, Korea, 1,700 pounds, America 

 (on small tracts), 1,892 2 pounds. In 

 Korea and Japan rice farms are small. 

 Some areas in America, rented to 

 Orientals, produce 2,157*9 pounds per 

 acre, but large farms produce less than 

 half that amount. 



Korean Rice Displaced in Japan. 



Although for two years before the 

 Russo-Japanese War Japan began to 

 collect an immense quantity of foreign 

 rice, the Korean market did not supply 

 any large quantity of these stores. For 

 1903 and 1904 Japan's imports of rice 

 from British India nearly trebled, not- 

 withstanding that the productive area 

 was increasing in Japan at rapid strides. 

 This laige import from the south no 

 doubt affected the comparative standing 

 of Korean- Japanese rice trade on paper, 

 but not in reality. In 1906, however, 

 rice began to ascend to its former place 

 at the head of the KDiean export list, 

 and consequently nearly doubled over 

 the returns of former years. This can 

 be accounted for by high prices of 1906 

 in Japan and the withdrawal of the 

 military forces from the peninsula, also 

 by the large quantities of rice held in 

 reserve in Korea at the close of 1905. 



The approximate value of Korean 

 export rice in 1907 averaged $2 - 50 for one 

 picul of 133 pounds. 



American and Korean Rice- 

 Farming Methods. 

 It may be estimated, on the basis of 

 " one-man plough " or " one day's plough- 

 ing," that the Korean farmers sow about 

 45 pounds of seed rice to the acre of good 

 land. The South-western American 

 farmer, according to the census of 1900, 

 sows about 80 pounds to the acre and 

 secures, on an average, 825 pounds of 

 rice from this area, while the Korean 

 farmer obtains about 1,700 or more 

 pounds from a like field. 



