CHINA’S MAN POWER.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 20 April 1917, Page 6

CHINA’S MAN POWER.

thousands of labourers tm-

PORTED.

TO WORK IN MUNITION FACTOR-

lES AND ON FARMS,

NEW YORK, April 4. The pick of Chinese skilled and partly skilled labourers is being sent from Tien-tsin,, China, Franco, at the rate of more than 1000 a week, and from Indo-China to France in at least equal numbers, mainly to work in French munition factories, according to a representative of one of the biggest British manufacturing and trading -concerns in China, now on a visit to the New 1 oik "branch of the company. '‘They are carried over to France at the rate of between 2000 or 3000 a ship, ” he said, “It does not take a largo ship to carry 2000 Chinese, for they go practically as freight. A Chinese can flourish in a space that would hardly do a white man for his grave. “Only the best selected stock is going to France from Tien-tsin. A large percentage of th e men arc sis feet tall. For ■the most part they are Chinese who have learned something about machinery in British mills and factories or in construction camps. Some are agricultural labourers, taken to France to increase food production. ' “The exportation of Chinese to France has been going on at Tien-tsin for considerably more than a year, and the number of Chinese now in France,, including those from French China, is probably sonsiderably more than 100,000.

“Before they can be induced to leave China these Chinamen all insist on a contract providing not only for their ■wages, which arc small enough, but binding the French Government to ship their bodies back to China for burial if they die in France. It also provides in detail for the apparatus of a Chinese burial. Ever)" Chinese who dies must have a new set of clothing for his appearance in the future world and for the food which goes for the spirit of a Chinese of his class, from rice to roast goose and pig. He must be assured that other funeral ceremonies will be faithfully observed, such as the burning of a string of tin foil imitations of Chinese monej', the burning of a paper house and a paper chair or carriage. "In ouh factories in China we pay Chinese workingmen who have some mechanical knowlege 121 cents a day American money. The contract which induces them to go to France provides for wages of 20 to 25 cents a day, and that is enough to recruit the Chinese as fast as ships can be found to carry them out.

“ There is no doubt of the great value of these Chinese in adding to the manpower of France. They are hard workers, and, while they have not quite the stamina of Europeans, they are willing to put in long hours and live on very little. Only those are taken who arc found to bo of better intelligence than the average Chinese workman. I should say that, generally speaking, three of them would be equal to two Europeans in the less skilled labour connected with making munitions. They rank even higher as agricultual labourers. "There is an inexhaustible stock of Chinese fit to meet the required standards, and the loss of those who have gone has hardly been perceptable on industries in China.

"With each shipment of Chinese go several Europeans, usually Englishmen, who talk Chinese. They act as gang foremen to interpret orders to the Chinese workmen. The Chinese, however,

is quick, when he is in a foreign country. to get enough of the language to enable him to do without an interpreter. “The English and French officers and civilians who arc recruiting Chinese in Tien-tsin and thereabout have no difficulty getting all the men they want. 2\n trickery or shanghaing has ever been resorted to.

“It is almost certain that before the war :s over Chinese colonies will have established themselves in France, and

possibly in every European counrry. While the Chinese who go to a foreign land always intends eventually to return to China, and often do, they have always stuck to new lands, where they have or mi got a foofhold, as in the United states. After settling for some time they usually send home for women and there is soon a younger generation wi.h a good deal of the Oriental worn off. Xu women, however, have accompanied the Chinese who have left Tientsin so far, “While a large number of the Annan. ites imported by France from IndoChira have been soldiers, and have gone to the front,, I understand they are now leaving French China for France in large numbers to labour in munition factories and on farms.” 1