DRIFT OF SOUTH SEA ACTIVITIES

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1012, 30 December 1910, Page 4

DRIFT OF SOUTH SEA ACTIVITIES

WHERE WILL'IT"END? . . [By Telegraph.—Special Correspondent.) Auckland, December 29. . Mr. Manning, British Vice-Consul at Noumea, who is at present in Auckland, informed a roporter that New Caledonia is rich in practically air the metals one can name, but, although the harvest is great, the reapers-are few. The natives, generally speaking, are not industrious, and, in any case, they are decreasing in numbers. : Indentured labour has been employed on occasions before now, and arrangements have been made to bring in 2000 Japanese and Javanese to work in the mines. These men will'have gangers of their own nationality over them, and the companies will hold them responsible for the men. Thus the little difficulties that have arisen in .the past through white overseers not understanding the ways of coloured labourers will be obviated. The two classes of labourers, howover, aire to be brought into the island on somewhat different terms. The Japanese will come as indentured labour, and receive about ,£3 a month and found, The Javanese are to receive about .£1 a month,, and found, they being brought in by a syndicate, which pays their passages and offers them for auction. The market price is .£l4 or .£ls a head, and the. purchaser has to pay the labourer. 16s. to .£1 a month and found, and pay his passage back at the,.end of the contract. But the labourers need not return unless they choose. .

, The Javanese, many of whom are bringing their wives, are very satisfactory, labourers. Although not of -such good pnysiqne as the Japanese, they are wiry, their standard of living is higher, and they are tractable and industrious. It Is not expected that the importation of 2000 labourers .will satisfy the demand except temporarily.. Everywhere in . the Pacific there is the samij demand. It exists.in New Guinea, the' Solomons, Tahiti, etc., 'and'.is 1 causing very-grave con--cern to capitalists. There appeared, Mr. Manning said, to. be no alternative to the Chinese! Japanese, and Javanese. Thei nhtiYey™er& dym'g'ofF, and although u'Site men could work' in New. Caledonia, there .-were 'places further., north where the climate, was loo: severe. . "This is bringing the: Yellow Peril' nearer our doors?" Mr. . Manning, - whois a New Zealander, was asked.,- . ■: ' He shrugged his shoulders. , ■ - , - A raining boom of some magnitude is now on at the island, and four sets of Smelting works are : going . up. Nearly all the minerals are found in the island, but nickel is predominant. / Thero is always keen demand for , nickel, in Europe, and. its production in New Cale-. donia lias been by tho discovery of. a new process-of treating ore by electricity.