“FROZEN CREDIT”

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18205, 28 September 1933, Page 3

“FROZEN CREDIT”

NEW GUINEA CURRENCY SHELL MONEY SYDNEY, Sept. 16. Even native races, using shells for currency, suffer from the effects of “frozen credit,” as is shown in a report from a district officer in New Guinea, which the Minister in charge of Territories, Mr Mait, received. The report urges the creation of a small coinage, in order to counteract the effect of the hoarding of shell-money by the natives of the Rahaul-Kokopo district, in which it is estimated there is more than £250,009 worth of this money.

The report says that, so far as white people are concerned, all but a small portion of this sum is “frozen.” A few whites, and practically all the Chinese, understand the use of this “tambu” or shell-money, but as it is valueless except for inter-native commerce (a considerable factor), its existence must hamper European commerce as well as native progress. “I have seen as much as £3OO tambu in one house,” the report says. “It would buy a motor lorry or a boat, but it is not aavilable for European commerce, except after a tedious disposal, by means of sales to natives of English money. ” “PURSE” OF SHELL GOINS

The report goes on to say 'that the Ratbaul-Kokopo native woman uses tambu just as the white woman uses her purse when shopping, and wherever native women are collected, there one can see in each one’s basket strung Bimini, cither the proceeds of sales ot’ foodstuffs and other articles, or for the purpose of purchasing them. “This is a hopeless situation,” it says, “and (he remedy is the supplanting of tambu (or any other form of native money in the territory) by a coinage smalt enough to meet the requirements of tho natives, European commerce not caring whether the coinage is small, so loug as it may circulate.” Referring to the increase in the amount of tambu in the district, the report says that while the depression has hit the natives, the,increase of population has led them to increase their currency, and they have gone to the Gasmata and Talasea districts to buy ■tambu with English money. It is said that mysticism plays no small part in the problem, for some of the tambu has been inherited by the same families for centuries.