THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [Feb. 2, 1903. 
TBE CAPE COLONY IMPORTED TEA. 
during 1901 to the value of £138,092, while the valae 
of the tea imported into Natal was £37,401. 
IN A REVIEW OF THE COCOA TRADE 
the Grocer says: — " This article is of yearly increas- 
ing importance, and each branch of the trade is 
continually making fresh strides towards a higher point 
of advancement than it had ever reached before. Apart 
from mere assertions, statistics prove that the quan- 
tities received and delivered in the United Kingdom 
are far ahead of those in previous years, and, confining 
the figures as taken from the official accounts to this 
year and last, it will be seen that the totil importations 
of raw cocoa during the past eleven months have 
amounted to 53,009,256 1b, against 49,40fi,166 lb, in the 
same period o£ 1901. A corresponding improvement 
WAS observable in the duty-paid entries tor home use, 
which ware 42,619 3941b, in comparison with 39,833,326lb 
last year ; and the quantity taken for exportation was 
also much heavier than in the first eleven months of 
1901, being 12,253,700 lb, instead o£ 10,710,189 lb. As 
a result of these extra outgoings, the bonded stock in 
the U.K., as officially stated, was by the 30th ult. re- 
duced to 10.030,0001b, against 15,097,0001b in the 
preceding year. As a defect which mars the com- 
pleteness of the Board ot Trade returns it may be 
noticed here, in passing that the compilers do not 
distinguish one desciiption of cocoa from another, and 
keep colonial separate from foreign sorts. The latter 
mode, it is but fair to say, is that regularly 
adopted by the authorities at the Port of 
London, where the landings and clearances of 
the leading kinds of cocoa are kept totally dis- 
tinct from each other. They are on that asoouut 
doubly interesting to the importer, dealer, and ex- 
porter, who carefully note every new movement that 
shows itself in this article of commerce and mann- 
faiture. To follow out this plan we therefore give 
particulars of both colonial and foreign cocoa as they 
enter and leave London, from which it will be observed 
that of the two main growths the former forms the 
chief portion of what is landed and delivered from 
time t') time as the season progresses. Thus, in the 
fi B'i fifty weeks of the present year, in comparison with 
those in 1901, the receipts and clearances of cocoa, as 
returned at this port, have been as annexed : — 
Home 
Landings. deliveries. 
Colonial pkgs. 102,450 87,830 72,700 T2 5hO 
Ceylon 35,350 32,750 25,850 12,200 
Foreign 80,850 89,500 62,500 58,700 
and 5,000 bags come in every week from St Thome, 
via Lisbon, and about 15,000 bags have already been 
sold, sub rosa, for arrival next February on terms 
equivalent to those for ' spot ' parcels in London. 
Guayaquil, on the contrary, in an exception to the 
prevailing depreciation in values, and is actually 
shillings clearer than it was a year ago. Beyond this 
there are faint signs of improvement or better prices 
in the cocoa market, owing to the fact that supplies 
nearly everywhere are most abundant, and more than 
equal to the demands from consumers." 
As is well known, the various 
SOUTH AMERICAN STATES 
play a very important p*rt in the production ot pro- 
duce of all kinds. Venezuela's chief industry is 
COFFEE PLANTING, and its greatest exports are, in 
the order of importance named : — Coffee, cocoa, 
hides and skins, timber, coprah, and cotton. 
Bolivia is a wonderfully productive country, 
and it is difficult to imagine a tree, grain, fruit, or 
vegetable that could not be successfully grown. Boli- 
via grows barley, o»ts, wheat, beans, potatoes, maiz3, 
and all kinds of vegetables and frniis upon the up- 
lands ; and oranges, pineapples, bananas, coSee, rice, 
oocoa, chocolate, vanilla, sugar-oaae. manioc and 
rubber in the forest-covered regions. There are others 
as the quinua, a grain indigenous to the mouutiiu 
regions ; the oca, a kind of potato ; the oherimoya 
or cnstai-d-apple ; the terabe, a fruit of a species of 
palm ; the guava, the granadilla, the fruit of the 
passion-flower, and many more. Thus great areas of 
the country m*y be designated huge gardens, and 
there are millions of acres of the finest timber, w itered 
by navigable rivers. British Honluraa has not merely 
its mahogany and logwood to depend upon, but vanilla 
cacao, rubber, sapodilla, and other valuable products, 
as well as useful woods of many sorts, are indigenous 
and abundant, and the soil in mmy large areas is 
peculiarly fertile a'ld suitable for the growth of sugar 
cane. Bananas, oranges, rice, and maize are onlya 
few of the products which grow luxuriantly, but 
scarcaly anything is done with them, and the bouote* 
ousness of nature has made existence so easy that the 
inhabitants have lived almost solely by cutting their 
mahogany. Even the natural forest produce remains 
nngathered, The vanilla grows so abundantly that 
the traveller when riding through the forest roads h\a 
often to clear away the vine of this valuable orchid 
with his machete before he can pass. The cochuae 
nut, which yields the finest table oil, grows in im- 
mense qu-intities, and is also entirely wasted. — E and 
C Mail, Dec. 26. 
Totals 
Colonial pkgs, 
Ceylon 
Foreign 
218,653 210,100 161,050 143,450 
Exports, 
30,600 20,500 
17,600 10,4ti0 
21,900 30,600 
Stocks, 
December 13. 
22700 24,900 
6,600 14,400 
33,700 41,400 
Totals 73,10) 61,500 63,003 80,700 
'* These totals confirm in a remarkable manner the 
general outlines of the Board of Trade returns above 
alluded to where in most cases the amounts entered 
during 1902 exhibited appreciable increases over those 
in 1901. It is, consequently, no wonder that, with 
an aggregate supply more than sufficient to satisfy all 
requh-ements (though leaving stocks materially lighter 
than in last December) prices of cocoa almost 
throughout the year have been materially below 
those" in 1901, For instance, under the influence 
of a large crop of Trinidad cocoa now beginning to 
arrive, tine red quality has latterly been sold at 653. 
per cwt, whereas last year it was fetching over 70s. 
The same may be said of the Grenada description, 
■which offers at 59s to 623, instead of at 633 to 683 in 
1901, or 83 per cwt cheaper than the article was in 
19J0. African cocoa has, however, been little affected 
by the depression existing for colonial sorts, as its 
firiacipal market is ia Liverpool, where between 4,000 
"OOOONtTT OIL PRODUCTS." 
New York, Nov. 12, 
An article in the Oct. 20th issue of the Oil, Paint 
and Drug Reporter under the heading of •* Copra 
Products in liliirseilles " has come before my notice 
and being personally connected with the largest 
refiners of these goods, I feel justified ia making 
some little comment ou the subject. 
I trust that you will give me an opportunity of 
correcting any possible misunderstanding to which 
former statements may have given rise that the 
Germans and French are ahead of British manu- 
facturers in this particular industry. 
The demaud for high grade and guaranteed 
pure, coconut butter is increasing with enormous 
rapidity in this country, among both the chocolate 
and candy manufacturers as an entirely satisfactory 
substitute for cocoa butter, and among cake and 
biscuit makers and confectioners generally in place 
of lard and butter. 
In view of this I think it ts only fair that Johnoy 
Bull should get hia due and it may interest your 
rendera to Isaow that ooaai4«(ably more ooconat 
