UMATRA. Practically all the coffee districts in Sumatra are on the west
coast, where the plant was first propagated early in the eighteenth
century. Padang, the capital city, is the headquarters for Sumatra
coffee. With climate and soil similar to Java, the island of Sumatra has
the added advantage that its land is not "coffee _moe_", or coffee
tired, as is the case in parts of Java. Some of the world's best coffees
are still coming from Sumatra; and the island has possibilities that
could make it an important factor in production. Sumatra produced
287,179 piculs of coffee in 1920. The total production of all the
islands that year was 807,591 piculs.

[Illustration: OLD-TIME SAILING VESSEL LOADING IN PADANG ROADS]

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF A DUTCH COFFEE-CLEANING FACTORY, PADANG]

[Illustration: COFFEE SCENES IN SUMATRA, NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES]

[Illustration: ADMINISTRATOR'S BUNGALOW ON THE GADOENG BATOE ESTATE,
SUMATRA]

The districts of Ankola, Siboga, Ayer Bangies, Mandheling, Palembang,
Padang, and Benkoelen, on the west coast, have some of the largest
estates on the island; and their products are well known in
international trade. The east coast has recently gone in for heavy
plantings of _robusta_.

As in Java, coffee for a century or more was cultivated under the
government-monopoly scheme. The compulsory system was given up in this
island in 1908, three years after it was abandoned in Java.

OTHER EAST INDIES. Coffee is grown in several of the other islands in
the Dutch East Indian archipelago, chiefly on the Celebes, Bali, Lombok,
the Moluccas, and Timor. Most of the estates are under native control,
and the methods of cultivation are not up to the standard of the
European-owned plantations on the larger islands of Java and Sumatra.
The most important of these islands is Celebes, where the first coffee
plant was introduced from Java about 1750, but where cultivation was not
carried on to any great extent until about seventy-five years later. In
1822 the production amounted to 10,000 pounds; in 1917, the yield was
1,322,328 pounds.

SALVADOR. Coffee, which is far and away the most important crop in
Salvador, constitutes in value more than one-half the total exports. It
has been cultivated since about 1852, when plants were brought from
Havana; but the development of the industry in its early years was not
rapid. The first large plantations were established in 1876 in La Paz,
and that department has