Butchering an industry

Media

Part of The American Chamber of Commerce Journal

Title: Butchering an industry
Language: English
Source: The American Chamber of Commerce Journal Volume 9 (Issue No. 9) September 1929
Year: 1929
Rights
Fulltext: .10 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL September, 1929 REASONABLE In an editorial in a series ot articles on the defects of the merchantssales tax the Manila Times cited one particular instance which it would be advantageous to correct even if the tax remain in general force—as of course it will. Reference is to the factory manufacturing in the Philippines and shipping to a home-office outside the islands, the shipments not being sales but goods delivered from one branch of a business to another, and the factory selling nothing whatever in the Philippines or elsewhere. To apply the sales tax in such instances is to burden the cost of manufacturing in the islands and retard the development of industries using our raw material and employing our labor. In fact, all taxes upon exports are disadvant ageous to the country: as the sales tax in one form or another will be con tinued in force, means should be found of applying it equitably to the entire quantity of imports and domestic goods entering domestic trade; and by equitably is meant that the tax be the same in Manila as in Mauban, for example, levied once and then no more during the transit of goods from source to consumer. There is nothing new in this, so we refrain from elabo ration of it, but it seems very reasonable and in practice should prove satis factory. COMMENDABLE The government sent no exhibit to Barcelona, for the year’s exposition there, but the Tabacalera, with an excellent exhibit, supplied the lack. This company’s activities advertised the islands well, as well as the com pany itself. Nine Filipino craftsmen were sent, two of them carpenters who built, it seems, a typical group of Philippine houses of bamboo and nipa. Seven are cigar-makers, who remain at Barcelona until the exposi tion closes. They demonstrate a craft in which the islands are today pre eminent, the manufacture of hand-made long-filler cigars. ’ Spain has been running two expositions, for there is one at Seville, but Ihat at Barcelona has had the better fortune with the public and is drawing \isitors to Spain from everywhere. BUTCHERING AN INDUSTRY It is unlawful to import beef cattle into the Philippines, saving that one man by competitive bid has been given the privilege of supplying 40% of the Manila market, the only large one in the islands, with imported cattle on a quota based so far back that he really supplies about 53% of it. He brings the cattle from northern Australia, whence there is no country be sides the Philippines that the cattle may be shipped; it is said upon good authority that they cannot be shipped even into a state of Australia without undergoing quarantine for six months at the state line. The packing in dustry in nortnern Australia having failed, he buys the cattle at his own price; and he pays our government the nominal duty of P2 a head. He may not sell the beef above P0.60 a kilo; his imported bullocks dress about 225 kilos each; his gross profits are estimated at very close to 100%. For his accommodation, the government maintains a killing station at Sisiman, at the head of the bay, charging him P0.03 a kilo for its use. He does a thriving regular business, running to about 150,000 kilos of beef a month, while shipments of Philippine cattle remain unsold in Manila weeks on end. He pays income taxes, of course. Our cattlemen pay income taxes, land taxes, animal-registration fees, and P0.05 a kilo, not P0.03, to the city for the use of the Azcarraga matadero. On this showing, the government is not consistent in encourag ing home industries. Our cattlemen may, in their extremity, begin sending frozen beef into the United States, from which may arise another agitation against Philippine products. TELL IT NOT IN GATH! While the water main under the Mari quina river was broken, the minority of Manilans felt the inconveniences that the majority endure all the time. But we had gathered our data for this comment before the main was broken. The health service tells us there are 36,002 houses in Manila, and that only 9,788 of them have sewer connections. Barbarism in milder or sterner form is the only recourse left to the families in the others. Yet the health service does not ask for more sewers, only for more pails! Some 20 and odd years ago, the ordinance, said to be still on the books, requiring all houses built to be connected with sewers was passed; it has been a dead letter, apparently, and the olfactory evidence of this needs no emphasis. During ten years the expenditure for sewer mains has been F175,000, about as much as the water administration has paid out in a single salary; and 15,000 meters of mains have been laid, about 11 kilometers, ap proximating one mile, each year. Another small appropriation, P250,000, is being spent on mains in Sta. Cruz, on Rizal avenue (the extension, no doubt), calle Florida and elsewhere—odd jobs here and there. Someone wants a main on upper Juan Luna, where conditions are revolting, but nixie. The means of being decent, it seems, are restricted to those who can pay for such luxury. Getting a sewer connection depends upon having a toilet, bath and wash basin in one’s house. The sewers should, however, be extended to all public places, and these places should be adequate in every community. While we place blame nowhere, we think it time Manila had more sewers and we a^e sure there are practical ways of providing them. “FOR THE TIME BEING” For the time being, said President Hoover, June 21, in the exercise of the police powers of his office, no persons from China or the Philippines may enter the United States excepting in accordance with regulations of the treasury department; and coincidently the department quadrupled, by new regulations, the space for each steerage passenger from the Philippines or China, permitted embarkation only from Shanghai, Hongkong and Manila, and that groups from each port be segregated from the others. Fourteen days quarantine of steerage passengers under the supervision of a U. S. public health officer prior to embarkation is also required. For some weeks, or until the President’s proclamation was amended to include Amoy as an embarkation point, no steerage passengers came into the Philippines from China, since they don’t embark from Shanghai or Hongkong; but now they will be coming into the islands again, only in the greatly reduced numbers dictated by the treasury regulations dividing the registered steerage capacity of ships by four. The total cessation of Chin ese immigration into the Philippines for a while, will be followed by mod erate immigration only; the annual net increase of our Chinese population by a surplus of o*,000 immigrants over the total number leaving the islands annually will be cut down—or more ships will go on the Amoy-Manila run and immigrants will pay higher for their passage. The prevalence of meningitis in China during the early part of this year gave rise to the new requirements for the time being, and our guess is that the time being will be a long, long time indeed. There is, we surmise, state policy of the United States, if not of the Philippines, behind the move ment; and the police power of the government was invoked to obviate the necessity of legislation. Or, even if originally the requirements were but a temporary expedient, what President, now that they are in force, would choose to revoke them? Surely not one hailing from California. The customs house tells us that during August this year, 329 steerage passengers from Manila went to Honolulu, 72 to Seattle, none to San Francisco; com paring with 750 to Honolulu during August of last year, 230 to San Fran cisco, 35 to Seattle and 35 to Vancouver, totals being 401 during August this year and 1,050 during August last year. Hawaii has been getting more workmen than she needs, and any num ber to Seattle or San Francisco is more than certain elements there want. It seems that Honolulu will now get fewer workmen, but possibly as many as she needs, Seattle will get a few each month, and San Francisco none or very few, the Hawaiian quota taking all the space on boats on that run. By carrying no Filipino steerage passengers for Seattle, the Canadian Paci fic may disregard the regulations and traffic on the old basis between China and Canada, but even one steerage passenger from Manila to Seattle on that line would compel compliance. Figure it any way you like, approve or not, thus the situation stands for the time being. More than ever before, in view of the facts, it is imperative to get more young farmers onto our own idle lands, the place they would all prefer. FRANK W. BUTLER We record with sorrow the death on August 26 of Frank W. Butler, a young member of the Chamber of Commerce who was the manager of the Walk-Over Shoe Store. He had lived in Manila nearly twenty years and was of sterling char acter and ability. Floral offerings and a crowded Cathedral on the occasion of the funeral, September 1, conducted by His Grace Archbishop Michael J. O’Doherty, attested the esteem in which Mr. Butler was universally held. In him an exemplary citizen and neighbor was beckoned away at a time when life had seemed to open promisingly before him. Sympathy is sin cerely extended to surviving kin, who, in the Philippines, are the widow, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles M. Cotterman, a son aged seven, Charles, and daughter aged twelve, Marietta. The body rests in La Loma, beside that of a son lost in infancy ten years ago.