Annual report on Northern Rhodesia / Colonial Office.

  • Colonial Office
Date:
[1951]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report on Northern Rhodesia / Colonial Office. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    of the mines, and there was little to spare for other industries. This led to a greater reliance on wood fuel, the transport of which resulted in an increased demand for imported petroleum and oil products, over and above that required for the normal expansion of traffic. Petrol remained rationed throughout the year, serious difficulties being experienced in August owing to a breakdown in railway communication with Beira. International trade in 1951 was freer than for some years past, and in common with other countries, the Territory relaxed its import and export controls. Control was retained mainly with a view to ensuring that the best use was made of the limited number of dollars available, and to regulate the export of strategic materials and goods essential to the wellbeing of the Territory. Although this chapter has necessarily outlined a number of diffi¬ culties facing commerce and industry in Northern Rhodesia owing to its geographical position and a communications system at present inadequate to the demands placed upon it, the statistics given in Appendix V record how great was the development of trade in the year under review. In January, 1951, the old Civil Supplies Department was reformed as the Department of Trade, Transport and Industry, with the object among other things, of providing encouragement to the investment of capital in the Territory. During the year many projects received assistance from this Department, and an organisation is being developed which should prove of increasing assistance to industrialists, and others wishing to establish themselves in the Territory. CO-OPERATIVE SOCIETIES No new consumer co-operative societies were formed during 1951 but societies already established have continued to make good progress. There are European consumer societies at all the larger townships on the line of rail, with the exception of Livingstone and Broken Hill. Societies experienced difficulties in staff recruitment and administration but in the main their progress has been most encouraging. There are at present few African consumer societies. Ample enthusiasm for such societies exists but few Africans have as yet appreciated the difficulties which the establishment of a co-operative store involves, or the extent to which hard work is necessary by both committee members and staffs if a consumer society is to operate efficiently. In this connection difficulty has been experienced in obtaining the services of adequately trained African staffs for such societies, since few Africans in the Terri¬ tory have sufficient knowledge of commerce or finance or even of commercial arithmetic and book-keeping. Producer marketing and processing societies enjoyed a most successful year in spite of the relatively poor harvest. The established European societies continued to serve the European farming com¬ munity efficiently. Most of the tobacco crop in the Western area was
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