White Versus Chinese Traders In Solomon

Islands

Contributed by a Solomon Islands Planter

A DOUBT is now beginning to enter the mind of the Administration of the British Solomon Islands whether it has been just in condemning unheard the white British traders and encourag ing the Chinese to ruin them.

Doubtless as the result of recent publicity in the P.I.M., the Government has given closer examination to the matter of European and Chi nese traders in the native trade. Though mak ing no admission or recantation, it is well under stood that the Administration has been non plussed at finding, upon further inquiry, that the despised white traders were giving the natives a better deal than the much boosted Celestials.

This was at complete variance with all its pre conceived ideas, which we have long contended were erroneously based on evidence supplied from ignorant or biassed sources. It now remains to be seen whether His Excellency the High Com missioner for the Western Pacific will modify the policy which is steadily driving the European small planting and trading class —our pioneers— from the British Solomons.

It must be incomprehensible to outsiders how the British Solomon Islands Administration should be so out of touch in these matters as to make the mistakes it does. The explanation is—lack of direct contact with the natives and so with the problems bound up with them.

In the first place, Tulagi itself and the adminis trative centres of the important Western half of the group are located in places there are practically no resident native populations. In the next place, few, if any, of the District Officers speak the native language of their districts. (But this disability would not be an important one if the officers only had more time to get into touch with the natives when on circuit.) So be tween the natives and the Government are the twin barriers of isolation and language. A busy D.O. can only attempt to cope with the former in the large districts, obtained by a few hurried visits to the villages in the course of each year.

The real contact established with the natives by such brief visits, which are usually fully occu pied by routine official business, is virtually nil.

The only inkling of native affairs that can filter to him through the language barrage, must per force come through native interpreters or Pidgin English, both of which are totally inadequate where matters of a complex or abstract nature are concerned.

Such being the case, is it surprising that the Government knows very little (and that little, very belatedly) of the problems of the natives, and of such complex questions as that of the clash of Europeans and Chinese in the native trade? That being so, if injustice was to have been avoided, the High Commissioner should have launched his hostile policy against the innocent white traders only after careful examination of the position, and not to have condemned them out of hand upon a few inaccurate reports from unreliable sources.

There is far too great a tendency on the part of the Administration to treat native trading as of negligible importance— good enough for Chinese or low-class whites. Whether that attitude is sufficient for other Islands we know not, but it certainly will not do in the British Solomons.

Almost without exception, the white traders of the Solomons are landowners or lessees of land

—debt-ridden small planters, mostly—who have a substantial stake of capital and years invested in the country they have pioneered and developed.

They claim that, as their properties are scattered about amongst the native people, amongst whom they have lived and worked for the last 25 years, they have a practical regard for and a know ledge of the natives exceeding even that of the Administration itself, and certainly outstripping that of any ex-coolie, itinerant Chinese trader.

Yet it is this tropical yeoman class that the High Commissioner’s policy is dispossessing, for the benefit of alien Chinese!

Serious mistakes will continue to be made so long as the Government remains ill-informed on the valuable and considerable native commerce and all its ramifications. It has been shown that the District Officers, owing principally to limita tions of time and place, can supply only a limited amount of sound advice. The Advisory Council, with the exception, perhaps, of one member, though excellently representing the planting industry,

possesses only a superficial knowledge of, and faint interest in, native commerce. This is evidenced by the fact that until the meeting just concluded no mention of the Chinese question had been raised in the Council, notwithstanding that it has been of outstanding importance for many years past. In the future the Council must give more consideration to matters affecting native com merce; the old, lofty, superior attitude thereto will have to be abandoned.

Regarding this Chinese question, in a Protec torate like the Solomons, the touchstone of all policies must be the welfare and benefit of the native people.

The Government should know that a Chinese never educates the natives with whom he may be associated, whether it be as carpenter, engineer, or trader. He jealously guards his special know ledge, and permits the natives to attempt only the most unskilled jobs. Contrast that with the attitude of the whites. Under the instruction of ordinary planters and traders many natives have become useful carpenters, concreters, engine drivers, and store assistants. The writer has known white traders who have taught their prin cipal native assistants arithmetic; while it is a common practice, after having taught the boys to weigh produce, to entrust large sums of money to them and allow them to go forth in charge of vessels and purchase produce from the native

villages. All this must be valuable business training for the native people, though the white trader has been given no credit for it whatever.

Contrast this helpful, kindly attitude with that of the Chinese. Look, and you will see scarcely a native employed in or about a Chinese store— certainly none will be doing skilled work—whereas the European traders’ stores are almost entirely staffed by natives doing work of all degrees, and being given responsibility to the limit of their capacities. Yet the Government which professes to stand for the advancement of the natives encourages the repressive Chinese to oust the help ful whites!

The missionaries join with the white traders in being astounded at the High Commissioner’s policy. It is felt that as the native must continue for a period in a state of tutelage, that that tute lage should be British —in commerce, as it is in matters of Church and State. Why should the natives in this British Protectorate be virtually forced under the control and influence of an alien race in commerce, while remaining British in other respects? Before it is too late it should be realised that the Chinese of to-day are not the humble, servile folk of yore—that they are now definitely anti-European. Even to-day, their con tempt for and antagonism to the white man are not being hidden from the natives, and this atti tude will not improve as time goes on.

The Government has nothing to fear as to the result of entrusting the British with the commer cial development of the native people. In Papua there are no Chinese traders—the country being spared the benefits alleged to follow their intro duction. Can it be said that the natives of Papua have been exploited by the white traders or hin dered in their development as the result of the policy of Asiatic exclusion?