Deo. I, 1900.] THE TROPICAL AGKICULTU£1ST. 
403 
STATISTICS OF THE PRODUCTION OF 
COFFEE IN INDIA. 
[The two tables appended state the facts re- 
garding; the production of coffee, the first in 
abstract for tlie fifteen years 1SS3 to 1899, the 
second in detail for the two years 1898 and 1899. 
It should be noted, however, that the figures, 
for which the Government are dependent upon 
the planting community, are imperfect and 
defective, — planters, for unknown reasons, some- 
times withholding information.] 
AREA. 
At the end of 1899 there were 274,298 acres of 
land under coffee in India, all, with the excep 
tion of 4c0 acres, in Southern India. The pro- 
duction of coffee is in fact restricted for the 
most part to a limited area in the elevated 
region above the south-western coast, the cdlfee 
lands of Mysore, Coorg, and the Madras districts 
of Malabar and the Nilgiris comprising 90 per 
cent, of the whole area under the pla,nt in 
India. About 17 per cent of this area is 
in Mysore, where there were 128,010 acres in 1899, 
and the plant is grown on 118,514 acres, being 43 
per cent of the whole, in the British districts of 
Coorg (72,296 acres), 'the Nilgiris, and Malabar 
(46,218). 
In Madras cultivation on an extended scale is 
practically restricted to t'le two districts already 
mentioned and to Salem and Madura. Coffee is 
also grown in Burma, Assam, Bengal, and Bom- 
bay, but in all these provinces on a very restricted 
scale. 
PRODUCTION. 
The yield has been very poor since 1896, that of 
last year being the worst of the series, and repre- 
senting only about 17| million pounds, this quan- 
tity being hardly more than half the production 
fifteen years ago. Though the recent poverty of 
the crop has been due in the main to adverse 
seasons in Madras, Mysore, Coorg, and Travancore, 
the fall in prices since 1897 has removed the stimu- 
lus which had been given for a few years to the 
further expansion of the coffee-growing area, while 
disease has combined with adverse climatic con- 
ditions to reduce the yield. 
Taking 100 to represent the area and production 
in 1885, the ratio of yearly increase or deci-ease is 
as follows :— 
Area Produ- 
Area Produc 
ction. 
tion. 
1885 
100 
100 . 
. 1893 
109 109 
1886 
97 
90 . 
. 1894 
117 101 
1887 
103 
109 . 
. 1895 
119 115 
1888 
104 
76 . 
. 1896 
121 73 
1889 
110 
85 . 
, 1897 
116 09 
1890 
114 
63 . 
. 1898 
118 68 
1891 
111 
113 . 
. 1899 
115 50 
1892 
110 
97 . 
PERSONS EMPLOYED. 
According to the statements there were 27,634 
persons permanently, and 82,656 teniporarily, em- 
ployed on the cotfee estates in 1899, making a 
total of 110,290 persons, which is equal to one 
person to about 2J acres. 
EXPORTS AND CONSUMPTION. 
The follovying figures are the average of the 
ten years ending 1899-1900 : 
lb. 
(Production ... ... 30,092,413 
■^Exports ... ... 30,017,680 
{ Left in India ... ... '^JflSS 
(Imports ... ... 1,.581,171 
1 Re-exports ... ... 735,862 
[Left in India ... ... 845,309 
The principal countries to which were shipped 
51 
Indian 
coffee 
Foreign 
coffee 
tlie Indian coffee 
were (in lb) : 
United Kingdom 
France 
Ceylon 
Austria-Hungary 
vjermany 
Australia 
Asiatic Turkey 
and Persia 
Arabia 
exported in the last three years 
1897-98. 
12,773,376 
8,607,872 
293,888 
591,360 
297,584 
199,024 
863,856 
630,896 
1898-99. 
17,392,480 
9,356,816 
505,680 
1,023,568 
618,688 
265,440 
131,264 
229,488 
1899-1900. 
17,610,000 
10,847,536 
1,224,272 
298,704 
292,.544 
272,496 
137,984 
85,232 
PRICES. 
Coffee is not sold, as tea is sold, before shipment 
for export, and therefore there is no Indian quota- 
tion of price. The average prices in London for 
East India plantation coffee since 1874, are here 
subjoined with their variations, taking the price 
of 1874 as the datum = 100. Prices dropped last 
year, as a consequence of the great expansion in 
tlie production of Brazilian coffee, to the lowest 
level known : 
Vari- 
ation. 
Per cwt. 
Per cwt. 
s. 
d. 
874 ... 
92 
1 
100 
875 .. 
107 
U 
117 
876 ... 
108 
2" 
117 
877 ... 
110 
01 
120 
878 ... 
107 
6" 
117 
879 ... 
100 
10 
110 
880 ... 
99 
9 
108 
881 ... 
91 
4 
99 
882 ... 
85 
4 
93 
883 ... 
85 
7 
93 
884 ... 
76 
44 
83 
885 ... 
75 
3i 
82 
886 ... 
79 
74 
86 
1887 
1888 
1889 
1890 
1891 
1892 
1893 
1894 
1895 
1893 
1897 
1898 
1899 
s. 
94 
85 
99 
106 
105 
104 
105 
101 
101 
99 
94 
78 
65 
Vari- 
ation, 
d. 
9^ 
6k 
10 
2i 
I 
44 
2 
11 
8 
1 
103 
93 
108 
115 
114 
113 
114 
110 
110 
109 
103 
85 
71 
J. E. O'CoNOR, Director-General of Statistics, 
September 6, 1900. 
PRODUCE AND PLANTING. 
TEA: A WARNING. 
Some recent comments made on the aathority of 
the Calcutta " Englishman " by the " Globe " of last 
Saturday are calculated to work a considerable 
amount of mischief to the tea industry of ladia and 
Ceylon. The statement in the "Globe" is as follows : 
— " If the Calcutta ' Eaglishman ' is accurately in- 
formed there is a growing disposition among InJian 
tea-planters to follow the same suicidal cour.3e that 
brought China tea into such grave disrepute. Until 
recently, the almost invaviabla practice jin Indian 
gardens was either to destroy or us9 as manure 
the sweepings of the factories. To some extent 
this rubbish is composed o£ tea dust, but 
sand, and even worse refuse, also enter largely into 
its composition. In some samples subjected to 
analysis, fully 50 per cent was not tea at all, and 
the buyer was consequently cheated out of half has 
money's worth. The same discreditable fraud is said 
to prevail to an even greater extent in Ceylon, with 
the result of a downward tendency in p)-ices, both 
in the colony itself and in the European market. As 
the sweepings only fetch five rupees a maund — 801b — 
it cannot make much monetary difference whether 
they are destroyed or sold. On the other hand, the 
depreciation of market values, consequent upon the 
lowering of quality, must involve a serious loss to the 
whole trade, while sooner or later Indian and Ceylon 
teas will be ousted from European favour by com- 
petitors with better charactei's. The matter is of 
such pressing importance that no time should be 
lost in dealing with it by measures of a sufficiently 
drastic sort. If nothing less will serve, the Indian 
and Ceylon Governments will have to prohibit the 
sale of sweepings under heavy penalties. It is not 
merely the commercial future of the industry that 
