In New Caledonia
pp. 39-40 · Read in the full issue
From Our Own Correspondent
Noumea, Feb. 6.
WAGES of natives employed on public works here are 200 francs a month when board is provided, and 375 francs without board. Daily wages are rated at 25 francs without or 15 francs with board, but if the time worked exceeds one month they are raised to 28 or 20 francs respectively. One hundred and fifty francs equal £1 Australian.
The- price the grower receives for his coffee (freight to Noumea at grower’s expense) is reviewed at three-monthly intervals. The present price for Arabica is 10 francs per kilo, and for Robusta 8 francs.
Two horses were sold for 25 francs (about 3/6 each) at a recent auction of mounts released from the French Army in New Caledonia. The biggest price paid for a horse was 1,050 francs (£7).
The new, officially-fixed taxi fares are handsome, from the taxi-men’s point of view. In the old days, the tour round what the tourist pamphlets used to call “the Comiche Road to Anse Vata and back via Faubourg Blanchot” used to cost 20 francs: to-day it costs 100 by day and 150 by night. The single trip to Anse Vata, the bather’s paradise, used to be 10 or 15 francs; to-day it is 50 or 60, and more at night. The demand for taxis to-day is usually greater than the supply.
One result of the war probably will be the rebuilding of the centre of Noumea on a more imposing scale, for this part of the town is still unworthy of its magnificent harbour. About 500 new brick and concrete houses have been con structed in the suburbs in the past ten years.
Antonin Brinon, a New Caledonian volunteer with the Bataillon du Pacifique, was killed in action in Libya on Novem ber 1. Aged 24, he was one of a family of eleven children from the coffee-grow ing district of Sarramea (La Foa).
New Caledonia’s European population, though small numerically, has a high birthrate—proportionately the highest for the French Empire. European births in 1942 numbered 225 while deaths were only 74.
After more than 18 years’ service in the New Hebrides, M. Emile Bon, head of the Treasury Department, has been officially honoured with a citation for dis tinguished service, particularly since 1940.
As Chef de Bureau at the French Resi dency he has had all sorts of special duties thrust upon him, requiring an inordinate amount of work with a vastly reduced staff.
Miss Hilda Bradley Aull, of Suva, Fiji, was married to Mr. Harold Williams, of the New Zealand Forces, on February 4, at Bishop’s Court, Suva.
A young half-caste member of the Anglican Mission in Papua, Francis Guise, is another to give his life in the service of his country. He was wounded while serving as an engineer in the “Maclaren King,” and died before he could be taken to hospital.
Mr. J. I). Rankine has joined the staff of the Fiji Secretariat, in Suva, after transfer from East Africa. His father is Sir Richard Rankine, recently retired from the British Colonial Service. Sir -Richard held a series of positions in Fiji in the ’nineties, and thence he went to Nyasaland and Uganda, and he was finally British Resident at Zanzibar.