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General.
OCCUPATIONS. WAGES & LABOUR
Chapter 2.
Apart from fishing and farming, which are dealt with elsewhere in this report, the major part of Hong Kong's popula- tion is engaged in commercial pursuits, and in employments such as stevedoring, shipbuilding and repairing etc., ancillary to the Colony's position as a great port and entrepôt for South China.
With a constantly fluctuating population it is difficult to estimate (except in shipbuilding where the numbers employed are approximately 16,900) the numbers employed in individual trades. It is possible, however, to give an approximate figure for the numbers employed in the three main groups of industrial undertakings. From returns submitted by the managements concerned, it is reckoned that in the engineering (including shipbuilding) metal and chemical industries approximately 24,500 persons are engaged; in public utility companies nearly 3,000; and in other manufacturing industries, 31,500. These figures represent a substantial increase during the year of the numbers employed in local industrial undertakings. This is in the main due to the further rehabilitation of factories previously existing, and to the setting up of a number of new factories by employers from Shanghai and Canton. There is every likelihood that this increase of employment in industry will be still further expanded in the near future with the establishment in Hong Kong of several new industries such as cotton spinning and the manufacture of plastic household wares.
Women and Young Persons in Industry.
A fair proportion of the workers engaged in Hong Kong's light industries are women, and recent investigations have enabled some assessment to be made of the conditions under which they are employed. Approximately 15,000 to 20,000 women and girls are more or less regularly employed in seventy different industries in Hong Kong. In addition fairly large numbers are employed as unskilled manual workers in the building trade and as earth carriers, etc. for road building. Of the numbers employed in industry, well over a third work in the weaving and in the knitted piece goods factories. Rather less than a third are employed in the metalware, electric torch,
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