HISTORY
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The immigrants formed a huge reservoir of labour, industrious, trainable for the necessary skills, with no tradition of trade union restrictive practices and all looking for jobs.
From the start, the industrial revolution was based on cotton textiles, gradually adding woollens and, in the late 1960's, man- made fibres and made-up garments. In 1959, 42 per cent of Hong Kong's total domestic exports were textiles and clothing, compared with 50 per cent in 1971, showing the continued dominance of textiles in Hong Kong's economy. Older light industries expanded, including rattanware, torches and rubber shoes, while new industries develop- ed such as optics, transistor radios and television sets, watches and clocks, stainless steel flatware, wigs and plastics, including artificial flowers. All needed labour as a principal factor of production.
In 1959, the first year they were separated from re-exports, domestic exports were valued at $3,277.54 million. In 1971 they had increased by 500 per cent. Re-exports declined in relative im- portance but remained significant, comprising 30 per cent of total exports in 1959 and 20 per cent in 1971.
At first Hong Kong catered for cheap Asian markets, such as Malaya and Indonesia, but in 1971, about 80 per cent of her goods went to industrialised countries, with the United States and Britain sharing about 70 per cent of this. The need for food ensured the dominance of China as a source of the Colony's imports, accounting for 21 per cent in 1959 and 22 per cent in 1967, after which Japan supplanted China with 24 per cent of the total imports, mainly in consumer products, against China's 16 per cent in 1971.
Government public works have necessarily been on the grand scale to keep pace with industrial growth. The 8,340-foot long airport runway, built up from the sea-bed in Kowloon Bay, is being extended to 11,130 feet. New reservoirs were completed at Tai Lam Chung in 1957 and Shek Pik, on Lantau Island, in 1963; the unique Plover Cove scheme of 1967 is being expanded to hold 50,000 million gallons; work began in 1970 on the High Island scheme, with a planned storage capacity of 60,000 million gallons; former cuts in water supply, which in 1963 were four hours every four days, are unlikely to recur. In 1964 China agreed to raise to 15,000 million gallons the amount of water purchased annually since 1960. Road development, including flyovers, has been remarkable. A tunnel, built by the Government, carries a new road to Sha Tin and communi- cations between Kowloon and Hong Kong will enter a new era with the completion of the cross harbour tunnel, now being built by private enterprise with government participation, in late 1972.