Apr. 10.
The fifth revised and enlarged issue of the original report, first produced by the Engfneer-in-chief of the Whangpoo Conser-vane in 1920, for the information of the international Commission of Engineers who came out in the following year to consider the future requirements Shanghai as a world port, made its appearance a few days, ago. Like all the publications of the Board it is a mine of information, concisely put and admirably arranged, and really no one who has an interest in Shanghai can afford to be without it. 2M) material, with fresh notes added, has been brought up to date to the close jof 1926, Also there is a splendid' map of the whole harbour, giving a detailed view of all the now numerous works on the Pootung side, the importance of which most of us have not yet grasped. Practically all information which anyone could wish for about Shanghai here, trade, population, climate, health, harbour accommodation, shipping, wharves road mileage, municipal revenue distance from all the ports of the world, conditions of approach from the sea, docks, engineering companies and a host of other details. There is really nothing of importance one cannot find here., And since Shanghai is indeed a "world problem", one may hope that this report will go all over the world for the fguldance of those with whom ite destinies will lie.
It may not generally be res ized that the watershed of the Yangtze has an area of 750,000 Square mules, or half Chiva proper, and for this enormous territory practically all the import and, export. trade must "pass through Shanghai. Fifty shipping companies are interested in the port, owning 600 vessels with an aggregate tonnage of 5,000, 000, apart from which there is all the junk trade, and the largest ship that comes up the length. In' 1926 the Maritime Customs entered and cleared 22,686 vessels of 33,823,429 tons; and the Native Customs 5,607 vessels of 2,652, 908 tons. Yet when we consider what the Yangtze is to Shanghai, and further how many coast' ports are dependent on this town for cargo, we realize that figures could and should is a proof be vastly exceeded. As a side important none the less, strikes one as grotesque and deplorable that ocean-going ships should Have to coal at Hongkong and Moji, The coal resources of the Yangtze Valley are probably overestimated in popular imagination and some of the deposits have been in-Jjured by unscientific working, But there is enough coal southwest Kiangsu, Anhui and Kiangai to cut in effectively on the Japanese supply which is our main source, even if the quality {is not s0 good, when one remembers how cheaply it might be Drought here, in comparison with the cost of shipping the Japanese coal the requisite 500 to 800 miles. Here, among other problems, we are confronted with the general one of transport, on which the Whangpoo Conser-fancy report makes some weighty observations. Still, in a country 80 wonderfully watered as China, transport should surely be a simple matter.
It seems a far ery back to the report of the Harbour Specialista referred to above, whose recom mendations us tothe future requirements of Shanghai were the subject of a special note to Peking in the year 1928, Sir Robert Hart used to say that it usually took him ten years to get nything done by Peking, even after it had seen the benefits of the proposed scheme; and unfortunately there is no. single authority now in China to say, "This can and shall be don However, the Harbour Special-isto' report still stands and one ig glad to sce it incorporated in the present work on Shanghai, In general outline it is familiar most readers. Big ships throughout the world continue to multiply; Shanghai must bestir itself to be able to accommodate them; and the formidable Fairy Flats stand in the way. The Whangpoo Conser-fancy publishes a_ terrifying diagram of what thie barrier means; and it is a fact that over the top of it, at low tide,' there 16tt of water, difficulty of dredging this are not to be unserrated. On the other hand the Whangpoo itself, presenting equal if not greater problems, is witness to what can be done and how it can be paid for out of the trade of Shanghai, At the present time the various rulers of China appear. to. be chiefly interested in destroying each other, and China, in pursuit of a quarrel which a little coolness, mutual forbearance and calm discussion might settle in a few days. But sooner or later the solid common of the Chinese people must reassert itself and there will be a chance for the development of Shanghai, It is not a question interesting only a few foreigners or a handful of wealthy Chine: merchants. These, after all, ai but the instruments and they cannot make money for themselves without making much more for many thousands of others. The future of Shanghai is really a keystone in the future prosperity of hundreds of mile lions of the Chinese people,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.