Arizona republican. [volume] (Phoenix, Ariz.) 1890-1930, 1899-08-19
Facts Called Up by the New
Commercial Relation
WITH The UNITED STATES
Figures Showing the Increase OF
Trade of fhe Island Empire with.
In the Last Five YearS-ThIS
Country Has Secured a LARGER
Percentage of The New Business
Than Any Other.


Washington. Aug. 1S.-(Special.)--
Japan and her new tariff. treaties and
relations to foreigners is the subject of
a monograph just prepared by the
treasury bureau of statistics With
new currency, new treaties and new
relations with the large foreign eIe-
ment which has played 50 large part
in the development of Japan. condi-
tions in that empire are a subject of
especial interest, present and prOSpec-
tive, while the rapid Development of
American commerce within Japan and
the market there opening for Ameri-
can goods adds greatly TO the interest
OF this study.
/. No other nation has experienced such
a remarkable growth in its commerce
with Japan as has the United States.
Japanese official figures give the i'm
portations from the United States in
1898 at 6,090,40S yen and in 1898 at
40,001 ,09I yen. Meantime her impor-
tations from England increased from
p. .929. CPS yen to g., T07,5 ,5T2 yen; those
from Germany. from 1913. 134 yen 10
25,S1O,961 yen; those from France.
from 3,305,277 yen to 6,979,9S2 yen;
China, from 17,O95,975 yen TO 30.523.-
$50 yen: While the only part of the
world which has experienced an in.
crease at all to be compared with that
f RI, TTni 10
Indies. in which the increase has been
from S,679,O2 yen in 1893 TO 70, 764,-
244 yen in 1898.
Japan's i1nportations have grown
enormously in the past five years. In
1898 they amounted to SS, 257.172 yen
and in 1898 to 1852. 166 yen, being
thus in 1898 more than three times
as much as in 1898. Meantime her
exports have grown from SO, 712. .S64
yen in 1898 TO 165, ,753, ,752 yen in 1885,
Thus the exports have doubled and
the imports have trebled during the
period under consideration, 1S93-1S9S.
With yearly consuming power of
21T,000,O00 yen or $13SO00.000, the
commercial wants of Japan are
worthy of careful study. This is es-
pecially the case when, as shorSn by
the above Statements, the disposition
is to look to the United States for
Il constantly increasing proportion of
its supplies L 1898, as already in
dicated, the Cnited States furnished
less than Z per cent of the imports
Sntfn in, A A
while England, our principal conpeti-
tor i'll the marets of the east, which
in 1898 furnished 81 per cent of Ja-
pans importations, in 1898 furnished
226 per cent. Not only have the pro-
ducers and exporters of the United
States developed in the past few years
a disposition to push their sales ia
that particular country, but Japan
herself is showing a disposition tc
make her purchases from the nearest
markets, those of the United States,
and has recently established steam
ship lines connecting with United
States ports.
Japan is, by reason of recent events,
the nearest neighbor to the United
States, aside from those whose terri
tory is actually contiguous, Canada
and Mexico. Her comparatively re-
cent exchange of mainland territory 10
Russia for the line of islands stretch
ing nOrthwar1Iy from her central
group brings her territory within
about 500 miles of that of the United
Sta;es in the Aleutian chain of islands,
while at the south her Eewly acquired
island of F'orm0sa lies within less
than 200 miles of our newly acquired
territory. the Philippines Thus not
only are the United States and Japan
''neighbors,' ,territorialIy, but their in
sular possessions combined stretch
aloc,g the entire Pacific coast of Asia
from Arctic to equatorial waters.