GERMANY'S LOST EMPIRE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 137, 9 June 1917, Page 13

GERMANY'S LOST EMPIRE.

SPLENDID ECONOMIC RESOURCES. Fortunately for every interest concerned the German colonies possess very little gold, although it is true that the diamond fields of "German South West" are almost as valuable as those of Kimberley. The chief value oi the German colonies is an agricultural one; given a new colonial system given sound principles of administration, Germany's late colonial empire will repay investment a hundredfold. Prior to the outbreak of tbe war the price of animal fats had increased enormously, and there was a steadily growing demand for vegetable butters; but Every German colony, with the exception of. "German South-West," is suited to the production of vegetable butter and its allied food products, while even "German South West" will assist if cotton can be grown, for cotton-seed also spells butter. The four main vegetable butler agencies in the German colonies are (a) the oil palm, (b) copra, (c) ground nut, (d) cotton-seed; two are the products of the palm trees of perennial growth, one a surface plant nnd the other from the earth kernel. The cocoa bean also produces butter, but at a price which prohibits consumption, but permits its use for the personal adornment of the fair sex. THE BUTTER PRODUCERS. Alike queen over all, both in beauty and productivity, is the oil palm found almost everywhere in Togoland and the Cameroons. Lord Harcourt recently pointed out that within the last seven years the value of the exports of raw butter products from Britain's West African possessions had "increased from £2,400,000 to £5,300,000," and there is good reason to hope that the next seven years will see the figure rise over £10,----000,000. There is no reason whatever why, under suitable conditions, tbe Cameroons and Togoland should not export £5,000,000 within a few years. The oil palm, growing everywhere, needs little cultivation; it only requires reasonable protection to give forth continuous supplies of butter. The cocoanut palm, the dried flesh of whose nut provides copra, requires cultivation, and only grows within some 200 miles of sea influence. "'German East Africa," and the possessions of the South Pacific have large eoaconnut industries. In 1912 "German East African" plantations contained 800.000 cocoanut palms, which, on a .ow average, should soon be producing 25.000,000 cocoanuts per annum. The ground nut is the favourite little

"monkey nut" which grows as an annual crop just beneath the surface of the soil. Every German colony produces the ground nut, of which Europe requires about 100,000 tons per annum. The seed of the cotton plant, hut little larger than the English pea, gives a useful oil for butter, nnd still more attractive ingredient for fancy pastry.

t'OCOA AND RUBBER. Tbe other two main products in German colonies arc cocoa and rubber. But. the German colonial policy of retaining plantation production as far as possible in the hands of white ownership wns not merely inimical to the natives, hut unsound from the financial point of view. This policy involved such heavy charges upon the industry that although Germany had •20,(100,00(1 'rubber trees, tbe planters could not compete with British rtibher, which now dominates the world's markets. The same policy is primarily responsible for the failure of the cocoa industry. Germany's cocoa-producing areas in West Africa cannot measure less than 100,000 square, miles, whilst the British areas ran hardly exceed "...000; yet the British cocoa production from the smaller area now exceeds £4,000,000, whereas the German production barely reaches £200,000.

There is only one way by which Germany's colonies can be made a success — by the efficient help of the black producer. White labour in any capacity is expensive; moreover, white labour cither dies or kills itself in the tropics. The relationship of the white man to indigenous production is that of a teacher, that of leading the native to adopt more scientific methods of planting, growing, harvesting, and marketing his raw supplies of nut butter, cocoa, rubber, sugar, and hemp. It is only by this policy that the late German colonies will be made fruitful and a blessing alike to the. colonies and to European and American civilisation.—J. H. Harris in the London "Daily Chronicle,"