AUSTRALIA AND CHINESE TRADE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXIX, Issue 6384, 5 December 1907, Page 4

AUSTRALIA AND CHINESE TRADE.

1 It is interesting to learn that tbe rei cent Chinese boycott of American goods , has given special advantage ' to the I Commonwealth. The boycott was imposed because the United States had .put an embargo upon Chinese immigrants, hut the determination to keep I out the Mongolian is just as strong | in Australia as it is in the United ( States. Certainly colonials carry out i their policy with a closer regard to j the proprieties than the Americans. The Chinese are not subjected, freI quently and freely, to personal violence in these countries, and they are on the whole treated by the respectable and responsible sections of the community as citizens. The Chinese would be quick to discriminate between a policy that simply seeks to exclude and one that adds insult to exclusion. Tho anti-Chinese legislation of Austral a and New Zealand stands upon a perfectly logical foundation, and tho Chinese, while they object to it, have never intimated that they would carry their resentment to the length of making trade reprisals. There is plenty of room for the free play of commercial operations that do not involve the ’question of‘inter-immigration, and it j is not at all certain that the Chiness J who carry on the international trade jare particularly anxious to flood these I lands with tie lower classes of their own people. At any rate, there are present indications that the volume of j trade between Australia and China is | on the increase, and the advantages !of that increase may qhite conceivably he -shared by this Dominion. According to the reports of Mr Choy Hing. a Sydney merchant, who has just returned after a visit to his fatherland, , China is it} a very progressive condition, and the old conservatism that obstructed expansion is wearing down. 1 Already, we are told, Australia docs 1 a considerable business with China in such commodities ao flour, sugar, jams, wool, hides, dairy produce, meat, and • particularly coal. Australian goods are found on sale wherever the Chinese congregate in other lands in tho Far East, even in Manila, which is a possession of the United States. Mr-Hing

points out that though the market is capable of great- extension it requires to bo exploited with care. The Chinese are not to bo put off with anything short of the best, and they are keen upon getting the bulk according to sample. In the past the reputation of Australian shippers has suffered through neglect of the commonest precautions, and ako because care has not been taken to study the special tastes of the English manufacturers, who have heretofore enjoyed the bulk of China’s import trade, have taken quit© unusual pains to meet the wishes of their customers. In these colonies the complaint is frequently heard that the British exporter is deaf to all appeals that he should consider our conditions; but for China he makes biscuits to “suit the climate,” just as he brews beer to stand the heat of India. England has many competitors now, but there is room for more. The value of China’s imports is something like £70,000,000 annually at present, with every indication of it® growing larger in the immediate future. The Commonwealth and the Dominion of New’ Zealand are fitted by position to supply raw materials, but so far our neighbours across the Tasman Sea are doing all the trade in this connection. Australia, thanks to the enterprise of New South Wales, has been singularly fortunate in her foreign representatives. Mr Valder, in South Africa; managed to sweep up all the trade of that sub-continent that was worth having for the Commonwealth, and Mr Suitor, who was sent out East by the New South Wales Government, has produced results similar in kind and degree. Our difficulties, in both directions, are concerned with shipping. Between Australia and China communication is regularly maintained by a line of steamers, while our connection is intermittent. With China’s needs growing, however, better opi>ortuniiies for this country must arise, and meantime no harm can be done by directing some extra attention to the subject.