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BRITISH MALAY A OPIUM COMMITTEE.
ANALYSIS OF EVIDENCE.
PAGES 1-18.
GEORGE GORDON WILSON, Malayan Civil Service, Superintendent
of Government Monopolies, 24 years' experience in Malaya, speak& the Hokkien
dialect of Chinese.
Effects of Oplum-SmokiDg.-Not nearly so bad as drink (7). Locally
a costly but not noxious habit (8).
Prevalence ·of Opium-SmokiDg.-Practically confined to Chinese adults (10).
Commonest amongst Hokkiens and Tiechius, Cantonese, Khehs and Hylal11s
smoke less (16).
Only present way of estimating number of smokers is by assuming' an
arbitrary normal consumption for a normal smoker and dividing that into
the total consumed (22). It is not possible to get any reliable figure (32).
Taking the Chinese adult male population for the census years of 19I1 and
1921 for the Straits Settlements the consumption in Tahils per head per
annum has decreased from 8·035 in 19I1 to 5·93 in 1921 (38).
Economic reasons are chiefly responsible for increase or decrease in
sate (45).
Control of use of prepared Oplum.-In the Straits Settl,"ments sole right
of . import and export of opium is vested in Government Superintehdent.
Import of prepared opium is totally prohibited, export except by Superintendent
is also prohibited. The right of manufacturing prepared opium is
a monopoly.
No one can sell without a licence. No one can buy except an adult
male. and no one can smoke in a smoking shop except an adult Chinese
male. The limit of possession of prepared opium for a private person is 5
tahils, of dross I tahil. Possession of raw opium is illegal (53).
Number of licences issued is more or less fixed (62). Areas are zoned
(68).
Increase 01 Control.-Do not think any further action can be beneficial
until China reduces her poppy cultivation. Only effect would be to encourage
smuggling which is already rampant (54). .
Government Shop •• "'-Think we could gradually take over all retail shops,
but am dubious about smoking shops (71). If Government takes over
retail shops present "on" and "off" licensees sliould be confined to "on"
licences (95).
Am against abolishing smoking shops. They will be a great help in
registering smokers. Also it is better not to drive smokers into smoking
at home. Also they make control of dross easier (9!r-I03)·
Dross.-We only get back as dross 10 to 12 per cent of the total amount
of chandu sold. This all comes from the smoking shops none from retail
. shops (I09-IIO). In spite of the law against having dross in your possession
ther.e is no doubt the private smoker consumes his dross also (II2).
Rationing of Chandu Sales.-As consumption varies with the different
Chinese tribes any system of rationing must take into consideration the tribal
composition of the population (144-149). No .common denominator based on
a common unit exists between one PossessIon and another. It does not
exist even between the component parts of British Malaya (150 - 151).
Registration of Smokers.-Have made an exhaustive study of this question
(152). Registration alone has no value for stlppression purposes. It
must go hand-in-hand with licensing and rationing (153)· Rationing would