Hongkong, June 25.
The stupendous influence which the west is exercising on Canton and Kuangtung Province in general is borne out once more in a statement which has just come from Canton. Every year that city imports about {$800,000 worth of coffee, which means that' the outside world' will have to change its ideas about tea-drinking China, Most of this amount comes from the United States, though Eng-Jand, Straits Settlements and India supply a part of it, according to the Foreign Trade Committee of the Southwest Political council.
The price of coffee on the local market ranges from $1.50 to $9,00 a pound. The popularity of the drink Is duo to the Westernization of the people in Canton, to the increasing number of restaurants serving European food, and to domestic consumption.
However, imports of general foodstuffs, from January to the end of April, were seen to have decreased, as shown by the same report. Grain imports in particular are down. One theory for this decrease in imported agricultural products has to do with the tax which was frst fixed at $1.00 picul and which has now been increased to $173 a picul The new scale has been effective since June 16, and actual collection began' two @ays later.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.