entrepot trade was severely disrupted by the U.N. embargo on trade with China during the Korean War. At the same time its population rose, from not much more than half a M illion in 1945 to over two million by 1951. In order to survive, the territory had to develop its own industrial exports, at first in a rudimentary way with textiles, simple plastic products, cheap electrical fitments and metal products. Markets were sought overseas, notably in the United Kingdom and the United States, through the plethora of commercial organisations that had grown up over the years to conduct the entrepot trade and using the already well developed shipping lines. By these means, Hong Kong became the pioneer of newly industrialising economies (NIEs).
8.
It was not until 1963 that Hong Kong's total exports had recovered sufficiently to exceed the 1951 level before the disruption of the entrepot trade. Then the contribution of its own manufactured exports was small. But by 1963 domestic exports accounted for more than three quarters of total exports, and the
In the early figure rose to more than 80% in the early 1970's. 1960's, too, the first big building boom occurred, beginning a process that was to transform the whole face of the territory in less than thirty years.
Hong
9. The growth of the local manufacturing and construction industries led to the increasing absorption into employment of the largely immigrant population, even though it continued to expand rapidly, both from natural increase and further migration. Kong's population has increased by approximately one million each decade, from more than 2 million in 1951 to over 3 million in 1961,
It is now about upwards of 4 million in 1971 and 5 million in 1981. 5.75 million. By the early 1960's most of the potential working population were employed. Ever since, apart from short periods of economic crisis such as that following the world oil cirsis in 1973-5, a situation close to full employment has generally been maintained. The effect of this has been to spread increasing prosperity to the labour force as competition for labour led to rising real wages. The real incomes of manual workers are now at least four times higher than they were a generation ago in the
1950's.
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