Sept. 1, 1902.] THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
17.5 
Capital Employed.— AccorJiuf< to the pub- 
lished accounts, the paid-up capital of the joint- 
?tock companies engaged in the production of tea 
approximates to sixteen crores (R15, 82,44,000), 
namely — 
R. 
Companies registered in India 2,01,69,000 
„ „ London £9,205,000=13,80,75,000 
Thus between 87 and 88 pe.- cent of ibe capital 
belongs to shajeholders in companies whose head 
offices are in London. 
Divided into the area actually under tea this 
capital stands at about R300 (£20) per acre. Tiiere 
is a further unknown sum engaged in the industry, 
representing the capital of individual owners, 
while on the other hand, the acreage includes 
areas worked by such private owners, including 
natives. On the whole, however, making allov,-- 
ances on both sides of the account, probably the 
capital value per acre stated above is not very 
far wrong. 
Peksons Employed. —The number of persons 
employed in the industry in 1901 is returned at 
606,8,% (permanently) and 90,946 (temporarily) or 
aliogether a little more than two-thirds of a 
million (697,781 persons), which would work out 
to about 1'33 persons to the acre. 
Exports and Consumption.— The tea produced 
in India is exported, mainly to the United King- 
dom, to the extent of nearly 97 per cent of the 
average production. The subjoined figures give 
approximately the quantity of tea consumed in 
India, the figures representing the average of the 
last live years : — H>. 
( Prodnced ... 176,349,300 
Indian Tea ^Exported ... 170,790,208 
i Left in India ... 5,559,092 
(Imported ... 4,961,607 
Foreign Fea \ Re-exported ... 1,898,271 
[Left in India ... 3,063,336 
Thus more than eight and a half million pounds- 
were left in India on the average, 5^ millions 
Indian and three millions foreign, the bulk of the 
foreign tea being Chinese, though a substantial 
quantity consists of Ceylon tea. 
1895 ... 97 1899 ... 58 
1896 .. 84 1900 64 
1897 ... 64 1901 ... 45 
1898 .. 61 1902 ... 22 
The production of tea in India and Ceylon has 
increased so much more rapidly than the consump 
tion in the United Kingdom, which is the principal 
market for these leas, that there has been a heavy 
fall in price and the tea industry in 1901 passed 
through a critical period, but prospects at present 
are much less gloomy. The restriction of output to 
which reference has been made, and the reduction 
of the quantity exported, had the effect of eleva- 
ting prices to some extent last season from the low 
level to wliich they fell in the preceding season. 
J. E. O'CONOK, Director-General of Statistics. 
INDIAN TEA. 
• DIFFICULTIES WITH LABOUR AND 
EXTENSIONS : 
moderate estimates and largely 
inckeased crops ! 
Some curious facts came out at the General 
Meeting in London of the Makum (Assam) Tea 
Company the other day. The Chairman stated 
(inter alia) : — 
It is almost impossible now to get "ooolies, except 
when they are recruited by our own Sirdars, and the 
difficnlty of recruiting labour has been found of late 
90 very serious that a large company, the Assani 
Frontier Company, have just purchased an old tea Com- 
pany in the recruiting districts in order to have a basis 
— in order to have a recruiting depot in the midst of 
recraiting districts. They have bought this company 
not to make tea, but simply to make coolies. 
Mr. Thompson stated : — 
There seems to have been £2,457 spent on the North 
Bank garden, and out of it we haveouly got something 
like £1,000 worth of tea under the present con- 
dition of affairs. I should therefore, think it would 
be wiso on the part of the directors to abandon the 
North Bank garden to stick to the Margherita ground 
A great deal of worry in the tea market is, not that 
there is not enough tea produced, but that there is a 
jolly sight too much produced. Therefor, if wo 
produced more, it would make matters worse thaa 
they are. 
But Mr. Densham (Mazawatte Company) thought 
otherwise ; — 
Growing, as we do, some of the finest tea 
that comes into the country, and whilst I am aa 
strong as anybody — I spoke at a meeting yester- 
day on the same subject — for the abandonment of 
land that does not pay, yet our company is so very 
heavily capitalized — I might almost say grossly over- 
capitalised — that we are absolutely dependent upon 
extensions for making dividends. Inasmuch as wo 
are growing some of the finest tea that comes into 
the country, I think it would be a most woful mistake 
to abandon a beautiful virgin soil like that. Hia 
(Mr Thompson's) remarks would be most forcible if 
applied to some other companies, but to my mind hera 
they are not in keeping with the facts. I should Bay 
let us go on planting out tea every year ; it is our only 
chance of getting dividends ; it is money sunk in the 
business. Over in the North Bank garden it is all 
young tea, and we cannot match Makum tea, wa 
want as much Makum tea as we can get into tha 
country. 
Mr. Seton : — The Chairman hag indicated to ua that 
the main reason why we are [not succeding now is tha 
great difficulty of getting labour ; and yet, Gentlemen, 
although that is a patent fact, we are going on 
opening another garden, for which we have of course, 
still less labour, and are consequently deprived of a, 
sufficient amount of labour for our Margherita 
estate. 
I would remind Mr Densham that he ia not taking 
account of the large amount of tea put in cultivation, 
the enormous additions of area which have been made 
comparatively recently. I should like to know 
whether you have decided at the present moment to 
stop making further extensions. 
The Chairman : — Absolutely. It is quite settled, 
You may be easy in your mind about that. 
Mr Seton :— Of course, the North Bank ia too amall 
to pay aa a separate garden. That throws ua back 
on the fact that we have got 400 or 500 aoroa only, 
and 1 am repeatedly told by people who have gardens 
in Assam that it is practically impossible to make 
400 or 500 acrea pay. 
The Chairman regretted the email outcome from 
the garden, and said he anticipated it would increase. 
I hope it won't, for if it does we shall be in a still 
worse position than we are in now. I will give 
you some idea of why I say so. In the course of 
my business I have to examine nearly all the Com- 
panies' reports ; and I have not taken up any report 
in the past year in which the directors do not hope, 
anticipate, and estimate a larger crop for the next 
year. If their predictions arerealised we shall probably 
see ten or twenty million pounds more tea. . . . 
I may appear to be talking a little strongly, but 
with a laige number of friends, who have invested 
considerable sums in tea, and whose £10 are not 
worth £2 today, we feel, naturally, a little hurt. 
I have still to tell my friends that tea is a good thing, 
but that on all aides it is completely overdone, and that 
foolish and absurd competition increases the output. 
I can only defend myself in that way, and in a 
