PACIFIC ISLANDS COTTON

Otago Witness, Issue 3148, 15 July 1914, Page 81

PACIFIC ISLANDS COTTON

A SUCCESSFUL EXPERIMENT. (From Our Special Correspondent.) AUCKLAND, July 6,

In Niue and the Cook Group, the island dependencies ot New Zealand, excellent cotton may be grown, but, lor reasons that seem to tlie energetic Britisher to be altogether inadequate, cotton is now never exported. When the Civil War paralysed the American cotton-growing industry, the South sea planters gave a good deal of attention to cotton, and for some years the export of this product from the Cook Islands was both large and profitable. Then when things settled down again in America, and the cotton-planters resumed their activities, islands cotton lost much of its profitableness, and the planters transferred, their attention to copra and fruit. Cotton may still be seen growing wild in the Cook Islands, and no one seems to think it worth cultivating. Within recent years, Mr H. Cornwall, the energetic Resident Commissioner at Niue, has made an attempt to establish the industry of cotton cultivation on his fertile island, but his scheme failed when it demanded as an essentia] the co-operation, of the natives. In 1910 Mr Cornwall obtained from the British Cotton Growing Association, Manchester, enough seed to plant four acres in cotton, and a hand-gin for the treatment of the commodity. The cotton seed was distributed among the natives, and the plants throve, and threw a good crop. In 1911, a fair sample of the lint was baled, and sent to the association, whose broker reported, that Niue Island cotton was “ clean, bright, extra fine, long staple, well worth growing; value Is 8d per pound if in commercial quantities.” Having thus demonstrated that cotton could be grown successfully for export, Mr Cornwall tried to induce the natives and traders to place the industry upon a commercial basis, but in this he was disappointed. In his annual report, dated April, 1913, he says: “ The record prices for copra that prevailed during last year, and still continue, have to a large extent been the means of diverting the minds of the natives from this new industry, but I still have strong hopes of persuading them to take up cotton-planting as a permanent thing.” When interviewed recently, on the occasion of the visit of the Hon. Dr Pomare to the island, Mr Cornwall sale that it ” appeared that so long as the present high and very profitable prices ruled for copra, the natives would not take up any other industry. While they had a great reputation as workers, the Niueans shared with other islands peoples the peculiar characteristic that thev would work on their own island no more than was necessary to maintain themselves comfortably. If the bottom dropped out of the copra industry, the natives might take to cotton planting, but so long as they could make money so easily with copra, there seemed very little chance of their becoming planters of cotton.

«. Asked if white planters might take up cotton growing in Niue, Mr Cornwall said that whit© men would have to face _ two difficulties —obtaining land, and obtaining labour. Land might be secured, on lease if the prospective planter were sufficiently shrewd to avoid the harassing conditions imposed by the natives, who were exceptionally keen business men, but after that he would probably find the natives demanding exorbitant rates of pay. Still, the experiment already made had demonstrated the possibilities of the industry, and he believed that sooner or later the exceptional facilities provided by Niue for the growing of a good class of cotton would be taken advantage of. The larger profits obtained by exporters of copra and fruit, with a smaller expenditure of time and labour, were the greatest handicap upon the industry at present, in Niue as well as in the other South Sea islands...