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The Earlier Industrialization of Hong Kong

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Frank Leeming
Frank Leeming
Affiliation:
University of Leeds
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Abstract

It is usually thought that industry was very limited in Hong Kong until after 1947. Study of pre-war Chinese trade directories indicates, however, that industry was already well developed on the eve of the Japanese invasion. This represented partly a surge in industrial growth after 1937, and partly long-established industry rooted in the local community.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , May 1975 , pp. 337 - 342
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1975

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References

1 That is, up to the Second World War. In ‘Social Structure and Social Stratification in Hong Kong’ in Jarvie, I. C. and Agassi, J., Hong Kong, a Society in Transition (London, 1969), p. 65.Google Scholar

2 Endacott, G. B., A History of Hong Kong (London, 1958), pp. 306, 393.Google Scholar

Szczepanik, E. F., The Economic Growth of Hong Kong (London, 1958), p. 135 and Table 15 on p. 159.Google Scholar

3 Quoted by Butters, H. R. in the Report… on Labour Conditions in Hong Kong (Hong Kong, 1939), pp. 129–33.Google Scholar

4 Butters, H. R., Report on Labour Conditions in Hong Kong, p. 136. The source of these figures is not given.Google Scholar

5 Hong Kong, Blue Book, 1940, pp. v, 1–2.Google Scholar

6 Hong Kong, Annual Report, 1963, p. 77.Google Scholar

7 The list in Butter's Report on Labour Conditions in Hong Kong of 1939 is also classified by kinds of business, but the numbers of establishments given there are generally less than in the Blue Book.Google Scholar

8 T'ang, Chien-hsün, Tsui-hsin Hsiang-Kang chih-nan (Latest Hong Kong Guide) (Hong Kong, 1950), p. 31 makes this explicit,Google Scholar

crediting Hong Kong industry with a ‘flying leap’ after 1937. T'ang also quotes figures for the industrial distribution of the Hong Kong population under the Japanese in 1943, based on an unspecified but apparently official survey. According to these figures, Hong Kong had 65,472 persons employed in industry in 1943 (op. cit., p. 10).Among Western writers,Google Scholar

G. C. Allen is exceptional in recognizing the force of the industrial expansion after 1937 (Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol. VI, p. 907).Google Scholar

The effects of the industrial expansion in these years can be detected in the trade figures. In the last years before 1941, Hong Kong had a rapidly growing export surplus of electrical goods and garments,Google Scholar

and the import surplus of textiles was falling rapidly (Hong Kong Statistics, 1947–67, Hong Kong, 1969 Table 15.4, p. 210).Google Scholar

9 Wang, Ch'u-Jung, Hsiang-kang kung-ch'ang tiao-ch'a (Hong Kong, 1947), in Chinese.Google Scholar

10 Blue Book, 1846. Ms. in Public Record Office, London, C.O. 133/3. These remarks were repeated in subsequent issues.Google Scholar

11 Blue Books, 1845, pp. 118–19; 1846, pp. 139–41; 1847, pp. 143–4. Mss in the Public Record Office, London, C.O. 133/2,3,4.Google Scholar