Chinese immigration and tin mining
Opencast tin mining was a very labour-intensive industry in which most of the workers were newly arrived Chinese immigrants. These coolies could be obtained and controlled most easily by the Chinese mining entrepreneurs which gave them, for a time, supremacy over the industry. However, this domination passed to Western companies from the mid-1910s when mechanization of the industry began. Also, stricter control over mining matters by the colonial government, including the banning of Chinese secret societies and the truck system, and the end of revenue farming licences, weakened Chinese control of the industry.
- Information in the full article includes
- Early beginnings
- Financing mine operations
- Labour shortage
- The passing of an era
