THE BRITISH TEA-PLANTER.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2483, 31 May 1909, Page 7

THE BRITISH TEA-PLANTER.

It is difficult at the present day to realise the change which was wrought in the Jives of British people by the popularisation of tea. Perhaps it is only by reference to the writings on this subject, published when the triumph of tea over beer as the breakfast and afternoon beverage was fresh in men’s minds, that we can gain any adequate idea of the enormous benefit which this dietetic revolution brought in its train. The pictures drawn by the advocates of the “foreign drink” may be a little overcoloured, yet can it be doubted! that “men have become healtheir, happier, and better for the change they have made?” We have only to imagine how we should be affected, mentally and physically, if we were deprived of tea to recognise at once all that it means to our comfort.

To the ingenious Chinese, of course, we owe our first acquaintance with the precious liquor which drives away “the five causes of sorrow.” But it is to British -enterprise that our thanks are due for bringing good tea within the reach of everyone. In the heyday of the Chinese monopoly the average value of tea in bond was about Is. Bd. per pound. At the present time, it is from 6d to 9d per pound. It is astonishing to recall that even as recently as 1886 China, sent us 136,000,0001b5., and to contrast with this the quantity imported last year for consumption, namely, a 'little under 9.000. India and Ceylon, on the other band, send us. more than 250.000. These figures throw some light on the, striking achievement which stands to the credit of British commercial energy in India. The establishment of the Indian industry was unhill work. Tea came first from China, and people naturally clung to the idea that China was the only drink. Against this prejudice, the British planter had to fight, although one of the causes which led to the determination of the Bengal Government 10 start the cultivation of the tea-plant was the “poorness of the quality of the tea imported by the East India Company” from China. But in the course of time the taste of the public was captured. We read in the article on tea in the “Encyclopaedia Britannica” : “Indian tea has now (1881) a recognised' position in the London market, generally averaging from 4d per pound higher than Chinese tea.’ ' After 1886 the China trade fell away, and is now merely a fraction of the whole.

It is one of the anomalies of our. present system of taxation that the product of this great British industry, which has been established an the teeth of formidable difficulties, and which has promoted the health and happiness of the nation, is heavily taxed, while non-British products, such as wine, coffee, and cocoa, are in comparison lightly treated. Indian tea is grown in the Empire* its cultivation and manufacture gtoe work to a great number of white and coloured subjects of the King and the British capital invested in the industry amounts to many millions. There are consequently the strongest grounds for according indulgent treatment to tea, whether regarded as a necessary food or as the product of British capital and labour. But these considerations in practice are set aside. What is the reason? It can only be that the inelasticity of our present system of taxation forces successive Chancellors of the Exchequer to tax tea because it has been taxed 1 before. Neither party can desire to continue the taxation or at least the heavy taxation, of tea. Such a course is opposed to the professed principles of the present Administration, and: it clashes with Mr Asquith’s declaration the other day that “no human being outside a lunatic asylum” would propose to place a tax on articles which we cannot produce ourselves. In spite of these sentiments, there is a duty on tea, and an abnormally heavy one. Because the tea duty was reduced in 1906 from 6d to 5d per pound it has been argued that the penny then taken off should now be' reimposed to help Mr Lloyd-George in providing for the deficit which is mainly due to the demands of the old-age pension scheme. But the reduction of 1906 was in the nature of a repayment of debt, and it was not repayment in full, for after the duty had stood at 4d from 1890 to 1899 it was raised to 6dl in 1900, and raised again in 1904 to Bd, At the present moment it is still higher than it was before the temporary war tax was put on. The raising of the duty did undeniable harm to the British producer and the British consumer. It restricted the ouput of the former, and it promoted the importation of inferior tea to the detriment of the latter. In 1901 the quantity of China tea on which duty was paid was 9,825,0001b5, and in the following three years the average amount rose to over millions. There is fine China tea, of course, just as there is fine British-grown tea. But the British consumer does not gain—he loses—when the importation o? China tea is encouraged at the expense of Indian, because the bulk of the former in the London market is of a common description. For good China it may be claimed that it contains less tannin, in the dry leaf; but this, after all, does not amount to much, as it is weaker than the British-lu-dian growths; and. as a larger quantity must he used to produce the infusion, the amount of tannin in the cup is about the same in each case, if, indeed, the advantage is not on the side of the Indian product. On the other hand,_ stuff which is really unfit for consumption is soldi in Mincing Lane at 24, per pound. In a recent trade report it is stated that grocers find it increasingly difficult to use China tea in their competitive qualities, andl that a considerable quantity has been re-exported for the manufacture of caffeine. The relief afforded by the withdrawal of a part of the added taxation was an acknowledgement of the urgency of the Indian planter’s case, and to return to the policy of squeezing him would be pure folly. It would immediately check the recovery which has begun. As for the consumer, even the withdrawal of a penny would be to his advantage. The consumer is undoubtedly reaping now the benefit of the remission in 1906, although at the time it was difficult to give him the benefit immediately of a reduced price.

In Franco and Germany; the people adapt themselves to the daylight hours instead of pretending to do so by putting on the clocks.

There is a substitute for the lift on the Paris “twopenny tube’; a moving staircase that will carry at least five thousand people an hour. A notice has been issued by the French army authorities stating that in future bald-headed men will be considered unfit for military service, as well as those who are so ugly that their ugliness may be a cause of terror to those who see them. Stutterers will also bo exempt.