1c.+Immmigration+and+its+impact+on+the+Caribbean

__**IMMIGRATION**__

__**Reasons for Caribbean Immigration in the Post Emancipation period**__

The planters believed that their most serious post-emancipation problem was the scarcity of cheap reliable estate labour caused by the flight of ex slaves from the plantations/estates after emancipation. Many of the freemen formed an independent peasantry through land ownership. The planters responded by importing **indentured (an indenture was a formal legal agreement or contract)** labourers from densely populated **agrarian (agricultural)** communities and they petitioned the colonial governments to support the various immigration schemes. Moreover, it was felt that in the longterm, immigration would lead to reduced wages for labourers when a new set of labour was established.

The Crown (British Government had four main aims in supporting immigration, which were to;
 * restore and even expand the sugar industry
 * create a steady supply of labourers
 * ensure that the ruling class in the colonies maintained control over the labour force
 * keep wages low by having immigrant labour compete for wages with the freed populace

__I**ntroduction**__

China and India were the first places that Europeans checked for replacement labour after slavery ended. The planters had already tried using other Europeans before the slave trade from Africa began and already knew that this plan would not work because they would have to pay high wages to white labourers. China and India seemed ideal sources of labour. Both were poor countries with large populations, which meant that there were many people who would see even the hard labour on the sugar plantations as an opportunity for a better life.

The first shipment of labourers left India just before the apprenticeship period drew to a close in 1838. Of the 414 Indians who came, 18 died on board the ship and 98 died within 5 years of landing in the colony. 238 Indians later returned to the subcontinent and just 60 decided to stay in the Caribbean.Emigration from India was suspended until 1844 because of this high mortality rate, while the authorities examined the conditions of retirement and shipping.

Between 1845 and 1847, Jamaica received 4,551 Indians and 507 Chinese. By 1854 though, just over 1,800 of these immigrants had died or disappeared. It is likely that many of them were killed by a cholera epidemic which swept through Jamaica in 1850. Between 1838 and 1917, Jamaica, St Lucia, St Vincent and Grenada received Indian labourers. Some people in Jamaica were against this importations of immigrants. Some churches also opposed Indian immigration worrying about the effects the Indians would have on African Christian converts. The Anti Slavery Society in England also opposed Indian immigration, saying that it would reverse the social and moral gains made by abolition.

The planters however saw immigration as the key solution to their labour and financial problems.Only in islands such as the Leewards, Barbados and Belize was there opposition to immigration schemes by the ruling whites and this was only because the labour supply was adequate. Even this situation soon changed because the freed blacks refused to work for low wages and became more independent so that by the late 19th century planters in some small islands like Antigua, St Kitts and Nevis were also calling for immigrant labour.

By the end of the 19th century, the West Indies had received over 300,000 Indian labourers. Some Chinese and Portuguese labourers were also brought in but in small numbers. There were also small numbers of European and African immigrants as well as ex slaves migrating to different islands for labour.

__**Immigration schemes**__

British immigration schemes;
 * The Madierans from 1835 to 1852
 * The Chinese from 1852 to 1893
 * The Africans - after 1841, attempts to bring free Africans from Sierra Leone and the Kru Coast in Africa failed because the Africans soon became aware of working conditions in the Caribbean. By 1869, 36,160 free Africans came mainly to British Guiana, Jamaica and Trinidad.
 * The East Indians from 1845 to 1917
 * The West Indians from 1837

__The Madierans__

During 1835, a few hundred Portuguese from Madiera were sent to Trinidad and Guyana but in 1836, Madieran authorities stopped the trade. However in 1841 the immigration was revived by the help of a bounty (gift of money or bonus) and 4312 Madieran Portuguese had entered Guyana. Many suffered from Yellow Fever and Malaria and from over work and inadequate food and therefore in 1842 the bounty was withdrawn and recruitment ceased.

Four years later immigration began again in Madiera and larger numbers were bought to Guyana and Trinidad while smaller numbers were bought to Grenada, St Vincent, Dominica, St Kitts, Nevis and Antigua. Between 1835 and 1851, 40,971 Madierans came to the West Indies with the largest amount going to Guyana.


 * n.b. Portuguese labourers did not come directly from Portugal but from the island of Madiera which was a Portuguese colony**

__The Chinese__

In 1843, Chinese immigrants were recommended for the British West Indies but the Chinese refused to come without contracts and due to the orders in council of 1838 contracts could only be made in colonies. After 1844 they focused on immigration from India.

Chinese immigration to the British West Indies began in 1852. During 1854, Trinidad received 988 Chinese labourers, Guyana received 647 and Jamaica 100. One ship with all these labourers left from Chinese ports Namoa and Whampoa. Chinese immigration and recruitment was expensive and the mortality rate was high therefore in 1854 it was abandoned.

It was started again in 1858 when two ships were sent to Guyana with 761 Chinese. In 1859 the British occupation of Canton made the trade easier therefore from Canton and Hong Kong, 11,282 Chinese were sent to Guyana and 1557 to Trinidad by 1866.

After 1866, Chinese immigration to BWI ( British West Indies) declined due to difficulties in recruitment, expensive transportation and competition from French and Spanish for Chinese Labour. Furthermore many Chinese wanted emigration in order to leave to do agricultural work which we found in Java and the Phillipines nearer to China.

__The Africans__

The British government did not want to recruit African labourers since if it was approved they believed that a form of slavery would be reproduced. Nevertheless in December 1840, approval was granted due to pressure for more labourers from colonial planters and governors. Immigration was hence introduced with labourers brought in from Sierra Leone.

In 1841, the first set of African labourers arrived in Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica by merchant ships hired by private merchants. European timber merchants in Africa feared that they would lose their best workers and Christan missionaries in Sierra Leone feared that they would lose prospective converts. Furthermore A fricans showed little interest in emigration despite the efforts to persuade them by offering high wages and free return passage to Sierra Leone.

Encouragement for immigration was absent in Gambia and on the Kru Coast so recruitment carried out in 1843 and 1847 was mostly successful in Sierra Leone.

The majority of Africans were obtained from seizures of foreign slave ships captured by British naval patrols in the Atlantic.

__East Indians__

A major cause of the large influx of Indian immigrants to the Caribbean is the factors in India itself. There were many people willing to leave India where there had been famines, high taxes and loss of land and where poverty was worsening under the 'raj' leadership at that time. Also certain aspects of Indian society, such as the **caste system*** and the difficulty widows had in remarrying, also made many people willing to emigrate.Indian labourers were successfully recruited in villages as well as crowded cities where large numbers of unemployed Indians could be found looking for jobs.

Indian emigrants left for the Caribbean from ports in the following cities; Calcutta, Madras, Bombay, Lucknow, Bengal and Bihar.

Indian immigration introduced new cultures and religions into the British West Indies. During the late 19th Century, the immigrants consisted of 86% Hindu and 14% Muslim. In May 1838, the ships called Whithey and Hesperas arrived in Guyana with 896 Indian immigrants. This first group was to be shared among 6 sugar plantations under 5 year contracts.However, ill treatment of the Indians and diseases caused many other deaths and in 1840, Indian immigration was stopped by the British and Indian governments.

Pressure from planters resulted in a second attempt at Indian immigration being made in 1845 and it lasted until 1917. During this period, approximately half a million Indian indentured labourer came to the Caribbean. They were contracted to work on the estates for 5 year periods and were entitled to free passage back to India or a piece of land if they remained in the Caribbean once their contract was over. If they arrived before 1898, males were granted half of the return passage while females were granted two thirds. Their fixed wages were 1 shilling or 6 pence per day. They got free medical attention and housing.

The governments of the larger colonies (Trinidad and Guyana) appointed agents to recruit workers in India who were shipped from Calcutta, Madras or Bombay. Men outnumbered the women and ships were unhygienic and over crowded.

On the estates, the living conditions were slave like. Labourers could not leave estates without a pass and they were subject to fines and imprisonment for being absent from work and for disobedience. There was much disease which led to a significant number of deaths. Those who survived claimed their return passage or acquired their own land.

The poor conditions for Immigrants led to the Indian legislative council in India passing the Abolition of Indenture Act and this is why Indentureship ended in 1927.


 * n.b The Caste system was a social order where people's status is determined by their birth into an assigned category and which they can never change.**

__West Indians__

Planters in Guyana, Trinidad and to a lesser extent Jamaica decided to attract labourers from the smaller islands with promises of work and higher wages.

These islands were losing many workers and in order to prevent this their governments tried to restrict migration to other islands to work. But the British Government overruled their restrictions. The only restriction was that people from small islands could only leave to go to the larger Caribbean islands to work for 1 year.

This did not stop inter-island immigration because by 1837, the number of migrants was large. From 1839 to 1849, 10,278 West Indians emigrated to Trinidad, 1,582 to Guyana and 790 to Jamaica. Barbadians went to Trinidad and Guyana while most Grenadians went to Trinidad.

__**The Effect of Immigration**__

__Economic__
 * Rising production of sugar and cocoa, particularly in British Guiana, Trinidad and St Kitts. But they couldn't prevent Grenada's loss of its sugar industry and the industry in some other areas declined anyway.


 * This improvement in sugar production slowed down diversification of the economy.


 * A minority of Indians became fairly wealthy through business. Others joined the peasantry and introduced crops such as rice, cocoa and coffee because of their knowledge of agriculture brought with them from India.


 * East Indians brought skills such as knowledge on immigration.


 * Many East Indians who finished indendureship remained in agriculture. They could do so because between 1885 and 1912, 37,000 hectares of crown land were given to the East Indiaans. 8% worked in agriculture. Some set up villages and grew rice and sugarcane.


 * Because the population was increasing the government improved public facilities, law enforcement and larger markets were built.


 * Chinese and Portuguese immigrants later went on to start retail businesses or became merchants

__Social__


 * Indians were numerically the largest group of immigrants but they settled in significant numbers only in 2 colonies - British Guiana (now Guyana) and Trinidad. In other islands, Indians were so few that they were either absorbed into the wider society, kept so much to themselves that they had no social impact or migrated to the 2 colonies that already had large Indian settlements.


 * Caribbean societies became plural societies or multi ethnic societies. In other words there are people in the Caribbean who are citizens of the same country, but who belong to different racial groups, different ancestral cultures, different religions or all of these.


 * For sometime, the different groups of immigrants worked together with the local population but by 1917 they were openly hostile to each other.


 * Various ethnic groups have enriched Caribbean culture. For instance the East Indians have maintained the practice of their Hindu and Muslim religions. At first, the Muslim and Hindu religion were despised by the Africans and the whites who were Christian. However, the West Indian immigrants who came to Trinidad and Guyana alongside the East Indians had no problem with the East Indians and their culture and had no conflict with them.


 * In the early years of immigration the East Indians were difficult to assimilate into West Indian society. They tended to stick together and not mix with others in society. They remained separate because they had a strong bond amongst family and friends.


 * The different cultures of the Africans and East Indians also kept them apart. Also the majority of Africans had adopted Christianity while most East Indians did not. The whites intentionally created separations between the Africans and East Indians to keep them apart. Also Africans despised the East Indians because they were paid the lowest for jobs and they accepted the jobs that they saw as slavery work. The East Indians despised the Africans because they believed them to be uneducated and shifting from one job to the next.


 * At first there was little family life among East Indians partly because of a shortage of women. Traditional Indian families re-established in 1870 with the free villages. There was still a shortage of women for some years after this. In these Indian communities, each person had to contribute to a financial pool where the oldeest member was in charge

__**Effects of immigration on the sugar industry**__

It is difficult to say whether immigration really saved the sugar industry. Sugar production up to 1842 delcined in most of the British colonies. Table 2 shows that by the 1850's production had increased in Barbados which did not have immigrants because there were enough labourers who were willing to work. However in Jmaica, which immigrants did go to, exports dropped.

At best, then all we can say is that immigrant labour may have helped some colonies and made no difference in others. For the West Indies as a while, sugar exports in this period increased from 202,396 tons to 315,136 tons, but this may have been due to factors other than immigration.

You should also bear in mind that profits would not have increased in tandem with increased exports, because sugar after emancipation was sold at lower prices.

Table 2 compares sugar exports 10 years before emancipation and 40 years after starting to use immigrant labour. It lists the same islands as table 1 plus Trinidad and Guyana.

Immigration may have helped increase sugar production except in Jamaica where it declined. This can be explained as Jamaica did not invest as heavily in immigration. In Barbados, production rose by three times, even though the island received no immigrant labour.


 * Table 1- Sugar exports in the 1820s and after emancipation (1850s)**
 * COLONY || SUGAR PRODUCTION || PAID LABOUR PRODUCTION ||
 * Barbados || 32,800,000 lbs || 78,000,000lbs ||
 * Antigua || 20,580,000lbs || 26,174,000lbs ||
 * St Kitts || 12,000,000lbs || 10,000,000lbs ||
 * Nevis || 5,000.000lbs || 4,4000,000lbs ||
 * Jamaica || 90,000 hogsheads || 28,000 hogsheads ||
 * Jamaica || 90,000 hogsheads || 28,000 hogsheads ||


 * Table 2- Sugar exports in tons**


 * **COLONY** || 1828 || 1882 ||
 * Barbados || 16,942 || 48,325 ||
 * Antigua || 8,848 || 12,670 ||
 * St kitts/ Nevis || 6,060 || 16,664 ||
 * Jamaica || 72,198 || 32,638 ||
 * Trinidaad || 13,285 || 55,327 ||
 * British Guiana || 40,115 || 124,102 ||
 * British Guiana || 40,115 || 124,102 ||


 * __Immigration in French and Dutch Territories (Non British Colonies)__**

__Dutch colonies__

In the 1850's, the Dutch colonies (Suriname in particular), began to import labourers from Indonesia. At the same time, Dutch East Indian sugar plantations were at a disadvantage because of their distance from the European sugar market. In 1869, the Suez canal was opened. This helped to shorten the distance by 5000km.

From 1870, Britian allowed Suriname to import workers from India following essentially the same procedure and contract used by the British. Before this scheme there were attempts to import Indonesians in the 1850's. Indian immigration was terminated in 1917. Indonesians stopped coming in 1938.

__French colonies__

From 1848 to 1861 - An unsuccessful attempt was made tp recruit immigrants from the French trading bases of Chanderragore and Pondicherry in India. They could not supply enough labourers for Martinique and Guadelopue.

From 1861 to 1886 - About 88,000 Indians went to Martinique, Guadeloupe and French Guiana after the French arranged to recruit from the British. This scheme stopped because of the French ill-treatment of the Indians.

__**Related Past Paper questions**__

1 a. Give 2 examples of cultural changes introduced by workers from India. b. Give 2 ways by which Indian indentured labourers contributed to the growth of the sugar industry in the Caribbean c. State 2 difficulties faced by Indian indentured workers in Guyana and Trinidad up to 1876.

2. Name 2 countries that received large numbers of immigrants from India after Emancipation.

3. Outline 2 reasons why Indians were encouraged to migrate to the British Caribbean up to 1876.

4. Give 3 reasons for recovery and growth in the sugar industry of Guyana and Trinidad by 1870.

5. Describe 2 ways in which Indian immigration affected the economy and society in the Caribbean.