Fall in with Cashew nuts.pdf

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Part of The American Chamber of Commerce Journal

extracted text: October, 1929 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE J 0 URN AL to correct that tow-headed kid’s deformity! And who in h— is a club-footed, tow-headed kid on a sugar plantation anyway? Just a lot of bother! George Wilcox failed, of course: he was so profoundly and incurably impractical. But failure that he was, he is still living, though up in his nineties and disinclined to work. In fact, Wilcox always was such a perverse fellow that he never would work unless he could see something in it—not even putter aimlessly in his carpenter shop. Now, he doesn’t even know what his income is, it’s so immaterial to him; and he has to tell the publicans they have on Kauai to go over his books and figure it out for themselves, setting down what they think he should pay. “What there is of it is there,” he says. The assessor has an awful time with him too, for Wilcox doesn’t know the value of his own lands! But they’re still in sugar, though only worth the paltry sum of $32,000,000, sugar being so confounded cheap and costing much more to produce in T. H. than in the P. I., what with “Fall in” with By Diversification of crops is the present Philip pine slogan; so, falling in line with the numerous requests of my genial friend the editor, I write this, the first of a series of short articles, founded on personal experiments and studies, as to the commercial possibilities of other than major crops, which can yield financial returns to those who wish to attempt their cultivation. I have chosen the cashew nut for the first of the series because it. is admirably adapted to the small farmer’s requirements, and also because the tree will grow anywhere, is insect, parasite and pest resistant, and commences bearing after three years of life. The cashew-nut tree, for which the botanical name is Anacardium Occidental, in Tagalog is called casuy. It is a small garbled tree found all over the Islands in a wild state, never having been cultivated up to the present time. It flowers in the month of March and fruits from the latter part of April until early in June. The fruit is a lemon colored, pear-shaped, spongy body, of a strongly astringent sweetish taste, repugnant to most people; for edible purposes this fruit so far does not hold out any promise. It can, however, easily be fermented and distil led off into alcohol.. The part of the fruit that chiefly concerns us is the small kidney-shaped nut attached to the lower end of the fruit, weigh ing from 9 to 10 grammes. Its shell is an elastic spongy mass, containing a black viscous ves icatory oil analogous to carbolic acid, known as cardol oil. This oil makes the nut difficult to handle. When the outer covering or “shell” is removed we find a small cream-colored nut ■which is probably the most delicious nut found in the world to-day. It is not astringent as are most other edible nuts, nor has it laxative or satiating properties. The edible portion of the cashew nut represents about 45% of the total weight of the whole nut; 55% is shell; recovery the higher wages and all. Filipinos long ago took the places of Wilcox’s Japanese and German families, and are housed in his better-thanstandard cottages and diligently working his unprofitable fields! The fate of mén such as George Wilcox is, is sad indeed; they just plod on to failure—seem never to care to get ahead. But after all, sugar conventions are lively affairs: everyone talks and no one really gets hurt. The final decision will probably be the one which is politically and economically wise. The industry is very powerful, able as it was to evoke from Governor Davis the utterances he made. By the way, Davis’s state, Missouri, once had a sugar industry, and was to be ruined if certain things occurred and it lost it. The things oc curred, about on schedule time, Missouri switch ed from sugar to mules; she was still doing fairly well at last reports. What was to ruin Missouri by ruining her sugar industry is not precisely recalled—maybe it was abolition. It got the old clay-bank commonwealth all Cashew Nuts E. M. Gross of cardol oil from the shell is about 10%. Many efforts have been made irrthe past to shell these nuts by machine, but the elastic, spongy nature of the shell, irregularity of size, and the caustic character of the oil it contains, have thus far been insurmountable obstacles to the success of mechanical devices. Hence the process resorted to in shelling is to place the nuts on corrugated sheet iron under which a quick fire is burning; the cardol oil oozes out into special receptacles placed to receive it, the charred shell then cracked with a piece of wood, and the edible nut recovered. Some dexterity is required to recover the nut whole, as they command a much higher price intact,— about forty cents gold per lb.,—than when they are broken; pieces are worth only about one half as much. It is advisable to desiccate the nuts before packing in order that they may keep longer. According to last American consular reports, India is at present the only country cultivating and shipping these nuts to the United States. During the past year Calcutta exported to the States over four million rupees’ worth of cashew nuts, and about half a million rupees’ worth of cardol oil The principal buyers of cashew nuts are the “Salters”. The Indian practice is to give the coolie a sack of nuts in the shell, forty per cent of the weight of which he must bring back in shelled nuts, in return for a stipulated price. The coolies keep the charred shell which they use for fuel. The burning is done in the open air, but this is ob jectionable as the burning process gives off a very acrid smoke, irritating to the eyes and throat. The writer uses a fuming chamber process by which a considerable quantity of crystal carbolic acid can be recovered as a by product. In Indian practice the nuts are not desicy het up under the collar, but there were enough George Wilcoxes there to save the day. There always are enough of ’em; there are enough in these islands, if they’ll wake up to their chances. Footnote: That smile Governor Davis'flashes about so genially seems to robe in velvet some mighty stern pertinacity. See how the probes keep digging into the government graft, and some of the grafters. How much is His Ex cellency smilingly having his way about things? It’s just possible, you know, that he commences to dominate the council table. It’s just pos sible that he occasionally says in Harvard En glish, slightly Missouri-worn, “Well, after all, I guess this matter had better be handled this way. Yes, I really believe it had; so, if there is no objection. . . . None? Fine! (with the smile out in full regalia), we’ll have it done that way, then. Thank you, gentlemen (more, and more persistent, smiling), and I guess that will be all for today.” Yes, it is surely a possibility; and interesting, eh what? cated, but when shelled are heaped in piles in the various go-downs prior to shipment. As a result, many of the nuts become worm eaten. These are not a complete loss, however, for buyers allow a 10% worm eaten product. During desiccation about 4% of water is taken out, and naturally results in that much loss of weight in the finished product, but this loss is compen sated for by a superior finished article, worm resisting more crisp in taste; in other words, a “nutty tasting nut.” Recently India tried shipping the nuts in cold storage to arrest worm destruction, but if they are desiccated, this becomes unnecessary. The nuts are packed in clean petroleum cans. Planting should be done during the month of May-June, spot planting being cheapest. Each tree should be given 50 square meters of space, or about 200 trees per hectare. After about one year the trees need little, if any care. They commence bearing in small quantities after three years, gradually increasing every year until about eight years’ old, when the yield will be about 500 fruits per tree, or a total of about five kilos of nuts, or two of the shelled product, which is equal to four and one half pounds. In the shelling process, even with care, only about 75% of whole nuts can be recovered; we can, therefore, sum up the yield of an eight year old tree per year, as follows: three pounds’ whole nuts at $0.40 equal $1.20; one and one half pounds of pieces at $0.22 per pound equal $0.33; total $1.53; harvesting and preparing, $0.53; balance $1.00 per tree, or $200 per hectare, not considering the value of cardol oil, the alcohol which may be recovered from the fruit, or the gummy exhudation from the tree, which can be made up into the best book-varnish obtainable. Cardol oil is used for the preservation of fish seines, as a wood preserver, and can also be used as the base material for the manufacture of a hair-dye (Alpha and Beta Anacardic Acid with Ammonia), which does not stain the scalp nor the hands. The sap of the cashew-nut tree makes the finest of indelible inks. The natives Retail /ine American ix., BOTICA BOIE C' MANILA Wholesale Agents Heavy Chemicals—Fertilizer—Manufacturers We have been selling drugs for 98 years TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE ¿ OF COMMERCE JOURNAL 6 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL October, 1929 use the tree for wooden heels or wooden shoes, as it is a very light and hard wood. For this purpose many trees are destroyed. Local use for the cashew nuts is either to eat them roasted or to mix them with cacao beans in the making of chocolate, for which it is very highly ap preciated. The largest number of trees at Your Newspaper: How It Came Here II One right which does not find universal sanc tion among Latin nations (but is esteemed by Latins individually as highly as it is by other peoples) is that of free speech and a free press. This right, naturally, was not enjoyed in the Philippines prior to the advent here of American power—when it. instantly sprang into activity. Even now it is not widely functioning in either Latin republics or Latin monarchies: Mexico and several South American republics now have the press under censorship, as Mussolini has it in Italy, a monarchy, and Rivera has it in Spain, another monarchy; so it seems that whether ruling in a monarchy or in a pseudo-republic, the Latin governing element looks askance upon the freedom of the press and never hesitates to humble the fourth estate at the knees of its elders. This is comment, not criticism; any view on the subject is empirical, since it takes a millenium or more of time to prove anything right or wrong in this world; the fact is, stating it without decrying it, that freedom of the press has never been firmly established in any Latin country now called to mind, and it seems, among such countries, to be buttressed by no constitu tional provisions. France will be thought of by the reader, and truly the French press has been great since Voltaire’s time. But that press, written by the people who write the world’s best prose, the French people, is largerly a subsidized press; and such a press is a press voluntarily censored by those who subsidize it. This limitation, in another form, is affecting the modern press elsewhere—as in America and Great Britain—but the government in those countries at least keeps its hands off. (What is meant is, that newspaper blocs are known in both countries mentioned which reflect in all the papers of the bloc the opinions, predilections and policies of the owner, while the absolute in dependence of other papers is modified in some instances by the fact that any great newspaper is primarily a great business, and in busmess it happens often enough that business considera tions must prevail. Items and editorials some times appear in newspapers because the business office wishes them to, and other items and com ment are kept' out for like reasons.) During the Spanish regime, then, in the Philippines, newspapers operated under a strict secular and ecclesiastical censorship when they operated at all. Those who were devoted to their letters endured the humiliations inevitably appertaining to the ownership and operation of a property under a superior authority in whose wishes one must acquiesce, and Filipinos had present is found in the hills of Antipolo and Bataan province, where the nuts are collected an nually and brought to the Manila market. The collectors ask twenty centavos per hundred nuts. A few of the fruits come into the market and are sold for edible purposes, but most of them are left to rot under the trees. nothing to do with them except as employes. There was, in Spanish times, no Filipino press; that, now very flourishing, has been a growth under the United States. But somehow some of the old Spanish editors held on, perhaps by patriotism and hope, or perhaps because there was no alternative, and, under the new regime, one of these at least became a distinguished editor. He was Romero Salas, of the Spanish paper El Mercantil. The Philippines appear to have captivated his Iberian imagination and impul sive nature; he sang many paeans to their glory, remained in Manila, reared his family here, and left Manila only for his deathbed in Spain, one year ago. The career of Romero Salas as an editor in Manila bridges the gap between old times and new. But though there were no Filipino newspapers under Spain in the islands, they began quickly enough under the Stars and Stripes, which give a free press, of course, constitutional protection save in time of war; and even then a good deal of leeway. Retana (quoted by Carson Taylor in his brochure History of the Philippine Press) credits the first Filipino newspaper to Isabelo de los Reyes, the cultured Ilokano who, aside from being a fiery politician and sectarian crusader, has contributed much to the cause of Philippine learning. His newspaper was El Ilokano, and may have antedated somewhat the American occupation of Manila. Taylor omits a date for it. The next Filipino newspaper was La Inde pendencia, born September 3, 1898, just three weeks after the occupation, in the printshop of the Augustinian home for orphans at Malabon, a ship-building village in the environs of Manila. This is the place, therefore, to record the fact that the friars and the Jesuits introduced the art of printing in the Philippines very early. There are records indicating that the Augustinians imported the first type and printing presses MOTORMATES ASSOCIATED GASOLINE and CYCOL MOTOR OIL Their Sustained Quality Assures —more “life” in your motor —more “life” from your motor ASSOC I AT E I) MANILA CEBU Associated Gasoline starts easily, responds to your throttle at all speeds, and gives long mile age. It is a clean fuel, refined to minimize carbon formation and crankcase dilution. No motor oil deposits less carbon than Cycol. It has amazing stability, and maximum lu brication value. Cycol lasts longer; it assures an unbroken, protecting film of oil where heat, pressure and friction are greatest. OIL COMPANY ILOILO LEGASPI IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL
Date: 1929
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