RUSSIAN VOLUNTEER TRADING FLEET.

Kumara Times, Issue 1116, 28 April 1880, Page 3

RUSSIAN VOLUNTEER TRADING FLEET.

During the month of March, it was announced that a regular steam navigation line between Odessa and Vladivostok would be opened by the owners of the so-called Russian Volunteer Fleet. Ostensibly the vessels will carry corn and exiles to Vladivostock, and on the return jour*ey take tea -to the Euxine; but is believed that in reality they are chiefly destined to convey to the far East- the military material required for the construction of the new privateer port in St. Olga Bay. M. Skalkoftski has been commissioned by the Ministries of Finance and of the Imperial Domains, and by the Society for the promotion of Russian Trade with China, Japan, and the East Coast of Siberia, to proceed by one of those steamers and make inquiries into the circumstances of Russian trade in the Pacific. The following heads of inquiry have been specified by the Ministry of Finance :—(1) On the possibility of establishing regular traffic between, the coast of East Siberia and China and especially Japan.; (2) on the causes of the unprosperous circumstances of regular steamship traffic in the North Pacific ; (3) on the possibility of establishing permanent traffic between San Francisco and the Amoor districts','and the development of the iocal gold fields by means of American machinery; (t) on the prospects of developing trade in Saghalien anthracite coal; (5) on the causes of the decline in the consumption of Russian manufactures in China, and on the competition which has arisen with the Russian tea factories in China ; and (G) on the possibility of extending the consumption of Japanese tea in Russia.