May ], 1901.1 THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST, 
793 
skilled labourers consist chiefly of Angoni from 
distiiets west of Lake Nyassa, and also of a few 
Angoni from Portuguese territory near Lake 
Shirwa and of Atougai, a tribe inhabiting the 
western shore of Lake Nyassa. This 
LABOR QUESTION. 
is a difficult one to solve, as the time when 
workers are chiefly required by planters, from 
November to March, is the very time when natives 
are reluctant to leave their homes, where 
they are wanted to cultivate their own fields. 
Unskille l labourers are paid at the rate of 3s 
to 4s a month, and skilled men get from 5s to £1 ; 
but while the former come from long distances, 
the latter usually live in the villages forming part 
of the estates. Planters calculate that they re- 
quire an average of two labourers per acre of 
cultivated land, so that 20,000 men are wanted 
to do justice to the land now under cultivation. 
Lack of assistance is the planter's incessant cry, 
and all of them greatly fear that the high wases 
naid in Southern Rhodesia may divert there 
the labourers and cause a rise in the pay, which 
would kill the coffee industry. Planters, I think, 
exaggerated the danger, and I doubt whether the 
proposed railway from the south will cause a 
serious exodus "of natives towards Southern Kho- 
desia, provided, however, that the planters treat 
their people better than they have done so far. 
Until now, it has been customary to allow the 
labourers, in addition to their pay, one yard of 
calico, equivalent to od, per week, for their food, 
but the natives within a radius of 200 miles from 
Blantyre will not sell food for calico. To obtain 
food the plantation labourers have to work on 
Saturday afternoons and on Sundays in the 
gardens 'belonging to the natives of the villages 
surrounfling the plantations on which they are 
engaged, and in exchange for such work they 
receive a few cobs of corn, on which they have to 
subsist for the remainder of the week. In their 
own country such people are accustomed to eat meat, 
and cobs of corn are not sufficiently nourishing 
for them, so that the natives who go to work on 
the plantations usually return to their country 
in a state of semi-sUrvation. Sufficient rations 
would mean to the planters only an extra monthly 
expenditure of )s. per head, and so long as 
labour does not cost more than five shillings per 
month, all told, plantations must pay handsomely. 
Mcst of the 
PLANTATION LABOURERS HAVE TO WALK FROM 
FOUR TO SIX HUNDRED MILES 
to come from their homes to tha coffee-growing 
districts, and as much to return to their country. 
On the way they uiiually sufler from scarcity of 
food, and most of them are more or less exhausted 
by the journey, so that they cannot perform the 
amount of work which they might otlierwise do. 
If the planters combined together they could 
easily get their men brought by steamer at a co'^t 
of two shillings and sixpence per head, which for 
four to five months' work usually supplied by these 
men would increase their cost by sixpence per 
month. If this were done the present scarcity of 
labour would soon cease to exist, and the danger of 
its being diverted .south would not arise. At 
present the people who come to work for five 
months in Blantyre are away nine months from 
their homes, so that none of them return to work 
two years in succession. The high wages paid in 
Khodesia do not constitute the attraction one would 
think to the NyLssaland natives. Most of those 
who have been to Salisbury, where they earned 
from one pound to thirty shillings a month, have 
returned without a penny, and they complained 
that everything was so expensive that they had 
been unable to save anything of their wages. It 
must also be noted that these people do not care 
to go so far away from their country among other 
natives, whose language they do not speak and 
whose habits are quite dift'erent from their own. 
Many planters, led by an irresponsible rag published 
in Blantyre, make a great fuss over the Adminis- 
tration allowing natives to leave the Protectorate. 
They forget that the Administration has no power 
to prevent individuals from leaving the country. 
Everything legally possible is done to discourage 
them. For instance, when a man applies for a 
pass to go outside the Protectorate, he must 
first show that he has paid his hut-tax, 
and must satisfy the collector that he has 
made provision for the support of his 
wife and family daring his absence. But 
more cannot be done. Stringent regulations 
liave been issued prohibiting the engagement by 
labour agents of natives to work outside the Pro- 
tectorate, and in order to help the jjlanters the 
Administrator has gone so far as to allow the 
natives to go and work in Blantyre, the first month's 
wa^es being collected by Government to cover the 
payment of the year's liut-tax. From Central 
Angouiland : alone 9,000 natives went down to 
Blantyre last year on those terms. To close the 
subject, I can only say that, as I have shown, the 
planters hold the remedy in their own hands, to 
avoid the present scarcity of labour and to prevent 
the exodus they fear, and if they do not adopt 
it they will only have themselves to blame for 
the consequences. 
FOUR YEARS IS THE TIME REQUIRED 
for coifee to bring returns. Trees begin to bear 
at the end of three years, but a full crop is only 
gathered in the fourth year. 1 have tried to 
obtain estimates of the cost of a plantation, but 
no planters seem to agree as to figures. Some 
calculate that, until coffee has been brought into 
bearing, £12 will have been spent on each acre 
of land under cultivation, about £3 per year, 
the cost of land, buildings, and machinery, 
not being included in this calculation. After 
coft'ee has begun to bear, the cost per acre is 
estimated at 20s to £2 per acre, to which must 
be added the cost of porterage and transport to 
London and the salary of European assistants, 
one man being sufficient to look after 300 acres ; 
but above that amount an extra assistant is re- 
quired for every further 150 acres. The returns 
vary considerably, according to the quality of 
the soil, manuring, and other causes. Some 
gardens only give 1 cwt'per acre, while others 
have produced as mujh as 7 cwt. The average 
return may be calculated at 2J cwt per acre, 
which, even at the present low price of coffee, 
ought to pay well. At the price of £60 per ton 
coffee should yield a profit of £40. The cost of 
porterage from the plantations to the navigable 
portion of the Shir6 Kiver varies from 30s to £2 
per ton, according to the distance ; and 50s per 
ton is charged by the transport companies for 
the carriage by steamer to Ohinde, at the mouth 
of tha Zambesi, whence the freight to London 
comes to £3 per ton, or a total of about £7 10s. 
As I have already said, Nyassa coft'ee fetches the 
highest price on the London market, wliere it 
