Part 25 (1/2)
COTTON, TEA, AND OPIUM
Next to the United States, India is the largest cotton-producing country in the world, and, with the exception of Galveston and New Orleans, Bombay claims to be the largest cotton market. The s.h.i.+pments have never reached $50,000,000 a year, but have gone very near that point. Every large state in southern India produces cotton, but Bombay and Berar are the princ.i.p.al producers. The area for the whole of India in 1902-3 was 14,232,000 acres, but this has been often exceeded. In 1893-4 the area planted was nearly 15,500,000. The average is about 14,000,000 acres. Cotton is usually grown in conjunction with some other crop, and in certain portions of India two crops a year are produced on the same soil. The following table will show the number of bales produced during the years named:
Bales of Bales of 400 lbs. 400 lbs.
1892-3 1,924,000 1897-8 2,198,000 1893-4 2,180,000 1898-9 2,425,000 1894-5 1,957,000 1899-0 843,000 1895-6 2,364,000 1900-1 2,309,000 1896-7 1,929,000 1901-2 1,960,000
The failure of the crop in 1899-1900 was due to the drought which caused the great famine.
About one-half of the crop is used in the local mills. The greater part of the remainder is s.h.i.+pped to j.a.pan, which is the best customer. Germany comes next, and, curiously enough, Great Britain is one of the smallest purchasers. Indian cotton is exclusively of the short staple variety and not nearly so good as that produced in Egypt. Repeated attempts have been made to introduce Egyptian cotton, but, while some of the experiments have been temporarily successful, it deteriorates the second year.
The cost of producing cotton is very much less than in the United States, because the land always yields a second crop of something else, which, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, ought to pay taxes and often fixed charges, as well as the wages of labor, which are amazingly low, leaving the entire proceeds of the cotton crop to be counted as clear gain. The men and women who work in the cotton fields of India are not paid more than two dollars a month. That is considered very good wages. All the s.h.i.+pping is done in the winter season; the cotton is brought in by railroad and lies in bags on the docks until it is transferred to the holds of s.h.i.+ps. During the winter season the cotton docks are the busiest places around Bombay.
The manufacture of cotton is increasing rapidly. There are now eighty-four mills in Bombay alone, with a capital of more than $25,000,000, and all of them have been established since 1870, including some of the most modern, up-to-date plants in existence.
The people of Bombay have about $36,000,000 invested in mills, most of it being owned by Pa.r.s.ees. There are mills scattered all over the country. The industry dates from 1851, and during the last twenty years the number of looms has increased 100 per cent and spindles 172 per cent. January 1, 1891, there were 127 mills, with 117,922 operatives, representing an investment of 7,844,000.
On the 31st of March, 1904, according to the official records, there were 201 cotton mills in India, containing 43,676,000 looms and 5,164,360 spindles, with a combined capital of 12,175,000.
This return, however, does not include thirteen mills which were not heard from, and they will probably increase the number of looms and spindles considerably and the total capital to more than $60,000,000.
The wages paid operatives in the cotton mills of India are almost incredibly low. I have before me an official statement from a mill at Cawnpore, which is said to give a fair average for the entire country. The mills of Bombay, Madras and Calcutta and other large cities pay about one-half more. At smaller places farther in the north the rates are much less. The wages are given in rupees and decimals of a rupee, which in round numbers is worth 33 cents in our money.
MONTHLY WAGES IN A COTTON MILL AT CAWNPORE FOR THE YEARS NAMED (IN RUPEES AND DECIMALS OF A RUPEE).
1885. 1890. 1900. 1903.
Cardroom-- Head mistry 17.00 24.80 34.90 33.00 Card cleaner 5.00 5.25 8.70 8.84 Spare hands 5.00 5.25 5.90 6.58 Muleroom-- Head mistry 8.50 19.60 34.00 36.42 Minder 5.00 6.37 6.20 7.12 Spare hands 5.00 5.00 6.00 6.50 Weaving department-- Mistry 13.50 18.00 18.80 17.81 Healder 5.00 5.50 7.60 7.09 Weaver 6.00 10.50 8.62 9.14 Finis.h.i.+ng department-- Washers and bleachers 6.00 18.00 18.70 21.25 Dyer 5.00 5.50 5.50 6.08 Finis.h.i.+ng man 5.00 5.50 6.00 6.53 Engineering shop-- Boiler mistry 6.00 9.00 9.30 10.16 Engine man 8.00 11.00 10.80 14.62 Oil man 6.00 6.00 6.20 6.64 Boiler man 6.00 6.00 6.90 7.31 Carpenter 10.00 10.00 11.10 11.67 Blacksmith 11.50 13.50 13.80 15.84 Fitter 10.00 11.00 13.98
These wages, however, correspond with those received by persons in other lines of employment. The postmen employed by the government, or letter carriers as we call them, receive a maximum of only 12.41 rupees a month, which is about $3.50, and a minimum of 9.25, which is equivalent to $3.08 in our money. Able-bodied and skilled mechanics--masons, carpenters and blacksmiths--get no more than $2.50 to $3.50 a month, and bookkeepers, clerks and others having indoor occupations, from $4.10 to $5.50 per month. Taking all of the wage-earners together in India, their compensation per month is just about as much as the same cla.s.s receive per day in the United States.
The encouragement of manufacturing is one of the methods the government has adopted to prevent or mitigate famines, and its policy is gradually becoming felt by the increase of mechanical industries and the employment of the coolie cla.s.s in lines other than agriculture. At the same time, the problem is complicated by the fact that the greater part of the mechanical products of India have always been produced in the households. Each village has its own weavers, carpenters, bra.s.s workers, blacksmiths and potters, who are not able to compete with machine-made goods.
Many of these local craftsmen have attained a high standard of artistic skill in making up silk, wool, linen, cotton, carpets, bra.s.s, iron, silver, wood, ivory and other materials. But their arts must necessarily decay or depreciate if the local markets are flooded with cheap products from factories, and there a question of serious consequence has arisen.
There is very active rivalry in the tea trade of late years.
China formerly supplied the world. Thirty years ago very little was exported from any other country. Then j.a.pan came in as an energetic compet.i.tor and sent its tea around everywhere, but the consumption increased as rapidly as the cultivation, so that China kept her share of the trade. About fifteen years ago India came into the market; and then Ceylon. The Ceylon export trade has been managed very skillfully. There has been an enormous increase in the acreage planted, and 92 per cent of the product has been sent to the United Kingdom, where it has gradually supplanted that of China and j.a.pan. Australia has also become a large consumer of India tea, and the loyalty with which the two great colonies of Great Britain have stood together is commendable. In England alone the consumption of India tea has increased nearly 70 per cent within the last ten years. This is the result of careful and intelligent effort on the part of the government. While wild tea is found in a.s.sam and in several of the states adjoining the Himalayas, tea growing is practically a new thing in India compared with China and j.a.pan. It was not until 1830, when Lord William Benthinck was viceroy, that any considerable amount of tea was produced in India. He introduced the plant from China and brought men from that country at the expense of the East India Company to teach the Hindus how to cultivate it. For many years the results were doubtful and the efforts of the government were ridiculed. But for the great faith of two or three patriotic officials the scheme would have been abandoned. It was remarkably successful, however, until now the area under tea includes more than half a million acres, the number of persons employed in the industry exceeds 750,000, the capital invested in plantations is more than $100,000,000 and the approximate average yield is about 200,000,000 pounds. In 1903 159,000,000 pounds were exported to England alone, and the total exports were 182,594,000 pounds. The remainder is consumed in India, and more than a million pounds annually are purchased for the use of the army. Among other consumers the United States bought 1,080,000 and China 1,337,000 pounds. Russia, which is the largest consumer of tea of all the nations, bought 1,625,000 pounds, and this was a considerable increase, showing that India tea is becoming popular there.
The industry in India and Ceylon, however, is in a flouris.h.i.+ng condition, the area under cultivation has expanded 85 per cent and the product has increased 167 per cent during the last fifteen years. The cultivation is limited to sections where there is a heavy rainfall and a humid climate, because tea requires water while it is growing as well as while it is being consumed. Where these conditions exist it is a profitable crop. In the valleys of a.s.sam the yield often reaches 450 pounds to the acre. The quality of the tea depends upon the manner of cultivation, the character of the soil, the amount of moisture and suns.h.i.+ne and the age of the leaf at the time of picking. Young, tender leaves have the finest flavor, and bring the highest prices, but shrink enormously in curing, and many growers consider it more profitable to leave them until they are well matured. It requires about four pounds of fresh leaves to make one pound of dry leaves, and black tea and green tea are grown from the same bush. If the leaf is completely dried immediately after picking it retains its green color, but if it is allowed to stand and sweat for several hours a kind of fermentation takes place which turns it black.
There are now about 236,000 acres of coffee orchards in India, about 111,760 persons are employed upon them and the exports will average 27,000,000 pounds a year. The coffee growers of India complain that they cannot compete with Brazil and other Spanish-American countries where overproduction has forced down prices below the margin of profit, but the government is doing as much as it can to encourage and sustain the industry, and believes that they ought at least to grow enough to supply the home market. But comparatively little coffee is used in India.
Nearly everybody drinks tea.
Three million acres of land is devoted to the cultivation of sugar, both cane and beet. During the Cuban revolution the industry secured quite an impetus, but since the restoration of peace and the adjustment of affairs, prices have gone down considerably, and the sugar of India finds itself in direct compet.i.tion with the bounty-paid product of Germany, France, Belgium, Austria and other European countries. In order to protect its planters the government has imposed countervailing duties against European sugar, but there has been no perceptible effect from this policy as yet.
The indigo trade has been very important, but is also in peril because of the manufacture of chemical dyes in Germany and France.
Artificial indigo and other dyes can be produced in a laboratory much cheaper than they can be grown in the fields, and, naturally, people will buy the low-priced article, Twenty years ago India had practically a monopoly of the indigo trade, and 2,000,000 acres of land were planted to that product, while the value of the exports often reached $20,000,000. The area and the product have been gradually decreasing, until, in 1902, only a little more than 800,000 acres were planted and the exports were valued at less than $7,000,000.
The quinine industry is also in a deplorable state. About thirty years ago the Indian government sent botanists to South America to collect young cinchona trees. They were introduced into various parts of the empire, where they flourished abundantly until the export of bark ran nearly to 4,000,000 pounds a year, but since 1899 there has been a steady fall. Exports have declined, prices have been low, and the government plantations have not paid expenses.
Rather than export the bark at a loss the government has manufactured sulphate at its own factories and has furnished it at cost price to the health authorities of the native states, the British provinces, the army and the hospitals and dispensaries.
One of the most interesting places about Calcutta is the Royal Botanical Gardens, where many important experiments have been made for the benefit of the agricultural industry of India. It is one of the most beautiful and extensive arboreums in the world, and at the same time its economic usefulness has been unsurpa.s.sed by any similar inst.i.tution. It was established nearly 150 years ago by Colonel Kyd, an ardent botanist, under the auspices of the East India Company, and from its foundation it was intended to be, as it has been, a source of botanical information, a place for botanical experiments, and a garden in which plants of economic value could be cultivated and issued to the public for the purpose of introducing new products into India. It has been of incalculable value in all these particulars, not only by introducing new plants, but by demonstrating which could be grown with profit.