636 
THE TROPICAL AGEICULTUEIST. [Makch 1, 1902. 
improvement and the higher grades none at all. 
That this taxation did attect producers was easily 
proved. In 1890 the duty was reduced from 6d. 
to 4d. per lb. and the result was two-told. There 
was an immediate increase in consumption, which 
rose from 189,500,0001b. in 1889 to 194,000,0001b. 
in 1890, although the remission of duty was 
felt daring only eight months of that year. But 
consumption rose to 202,500,000 lb. in 1891, 
showing quite an abnormal increase of 8,500,000 
lb. in that year. The other effect was an increased 
demand for lower grades, which formed tlie bulk 
of the consumption. To such an extent did this 
go that they increased in value ahnost as much 
in amount as the amount of the duty remitted, 
When, however, tiie Chancellor reimposed the 
duty in March, 1900, the reverse happened, and 
the price of lower-grade teas fell fully 2^d per 
lb., and the average price of all Indian tea was 
, reduced from 8|d. the price in 1889, to 7|d. in 
1900, and to 7id in 1901 — proving, as they thought, 
that to a great extent that tax fell upon tiie 
producers. 
The Chancellor of the Exchequer: You 
have given over-production as the cause. 
Mr. Bryans replied that that was partly res- 
ponsible, but the fall would not have been nearly 
80 much as it was but for the extra duty. The 
later rise in price had been obtained by a great 
decrease in the yield per acre. The season had 
been a bad. one for crops, and the small increase 
in price was by no means a gain to them, for a 
small crop cost more per lb to produce than a 
large one. Indeed, the industry as a whole was 
most unsatisfactory, as was evidenced by the 
marked decline in all the Companies' shares. The 
market value of 45 Companies' shares in July 1897 
was £11,000.000, in January 1900 it wbs £9 6uO,O0O, 
in January 1901 £8,550,000; and at present it was 
at some figure below £7,000,000. There were 
many millions sterling hardly earning any divi- 
dend and it was at; this moment that a 
great newspaper and a great statistician ad- 
vocated a great increase of duty ! What the 
Chancellor of the Exchequer said last year 
showed that he appreciated that the industry was 
passing through a severe crisis in its liistory, and 
that this crisis would continue there could be no 
doubt. Every possible assistance by way of duty 
was absolutely necessary if they were to survive. 
The rival beverages paid no extra duty and tea 
from China was practically bounty-fed. He hoped 
Sir Michael Hicks-Beach would not think they had 
stated their case too strongly, and that he would 
be able to send them away with some crumb of 
comfort after he had heard them. 
MR. H. BOIS FOR THE CEYLON ASSOCIATION. 
Mr Henry Bois said that as the president ot 
the Ceylon Association in London he had to f-peak 
on behalf of the tea producers of Ceylon, who were 
to a great extent represented by the Association. 
There were 387,000 acres of land under tea cul- 
tivation in Ceylon, producing 145,000,000 lb of 
tea, and representing an invested capital of 
£15,000,000. When the extra duty of 2d in the 
£ was imposed on tea in 1900, the tea producers of 
Ceylon did not make any representations to 
Government as to tlie elloet the tea duty would 
liaveon the industry, and perhaps their inaction 
on that occasion had been somewhat misunder- 
stood. It had been perhaps assumed that they 
made no protest because they thought that the 
^xtra duty would to a great extent fall upon the 
consumer and that their interests as producers 
would not be aliected by it. That was not the 
case. There was a general apprehension that it 
would fall largely upon the producer. They had been 
animated by other motives. The tea pioducers in 
Ceylon and India were not less patriotic than 
British subjects in other countries ; they 
recognised that the Empire had been forced into 
a very costly war, and they did not wish to 
appear unwilling to bear their share ot the bur- 
dens. But later they had Keen that the extra duty 
had fallen almost entirely upon the producer, and 
they addressed to the Chancellor of the Exche- 
quer a memorial pointing out the depressed 
state of the tea industry and asking that the duty 
should be reduced. He did not think they had any 
sanguine expectations that it would be leduced, 
but they desired to put the case before the 
Chancellor in order to show how adversely any 
further duty would bear upon them. He (the 
speaker) thought tliat no formal answer was 
received to that memorial, but in Sir Michael 
Hicks Beach's Budget speech some time afterwards 
he referred in sympathetic teruis to the statement 
they had put before him, and although he laid 
stress — and, he (the speaker) thought, justly — 
upon the fact that the pressure had bfen caused by 
over production, he stated that the tea industry 
was a British industry which was already taxed 
to about 80 per cent of its value, and that when 
the time came for red iiceJ taxation tea would be 
the first to receive consideration. 
ChAnceller of the Exchequer : Before two 
other articles, I said. 
Mr Bois, proceeding, said that with that 
statement by the Chancellor of the Exchequer the 
tea producers had remained satisfied, and they 
would be satisfied still but for the fact that 
proposals had been put forward to still further add 
considerably to the tea duty. Thpy were qaite 
aware that suggestions from unofficial sources, 
however distinguished the individuals might be, 
must not be taken as representing the views 
of His Majesty's Government ; but it was a 
fact that the proposed increase in the duty had 
caused wide-spread consternation in Ceylon and 
India. He had received a letter from the Chair- 
man of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce on the 
preceding day, saying that if the Chancellor of 
the Exchequer listened to these suggestions it 
would just about finish us." The position of the 
tea industry at the present moment was one of 
very great financial depression. In 1900 the price 
of Ceylon tea fell fd per lb, and in the following 
year it fell Jd per lb -and in this second year 
the actual fall in price was not the full measure 
of the difference in price between that and the 
preceding year, beeause owing to finer plucking 
which had been resorted to with a view to re- 
ducing output, the quality ot the tea was much 
better in 1901 than in 1900, and consumers paid 
-Jd per lb less for tea which was from fd to Id per lb 
better in quality. There had also been a slight 
increase in the cost of production. There was a 
certain fixed amount of expenditure on the estates, 
and if the quantity of tea produced was reduced, 
it followed that the cost per lb. was increased. 
As regarded 1900, he was not prepared to lay any 
great stress on the reduction in price in that year, 
because there was justice in the Chancellor of 
the Exchequer's remark that it was largely due 
to over-production. But 1901 was not a year of 
over-production, and it was fair to assume tha^ 
