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History

utilities were seriously impaired. Many residents moved to Macao, the neutral Portuguese enclave hospitably opening its doors to them. Towards the end of the occupation, the Japanese sought to ease the food problems by organising mass deportations.

In the face of increasing oppression, the bulk of the community remained loyal to the anti- Japanese cause. In February 1942, the Hong Kong-Kowloon Independent Battalion of the East River Column was established in Wong Mo Ying, a village in Sai Kung. It attacked Japanese bases and shipping lines on the sea. Together with Allied forces, it rescued prisoners of war. Soon after news of the Japanese surrender was received on 15 August 1945, a provisional government was set up by the Colonial Secretary, Mr (later Sir) Frank Gimson, who had spent the occupation imprisoned in Stanley Gaol. On 30 August, Rear Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt arrived with units of the British Pacific Fleet to establish a temporary military government. Civil government was formally restored on 1 May 1946, when Sir Mark Young resumed his interrupted governorship.

Post-war Years

After the Japanese surrender, Chinese civilians, many of whom had moved to the Mainland during the war, returned at a rate of almost 100,000 a month. The population, which by August 1945 had been reduced to about 600,000, rose by the end of 1947 to an estimated 1.8 million. In 1948-49, as the forces of the Chinese Nationalist Government faced defeat in civil war at the hands of the Communists, Hong Kong received an influx unparalleled in its history. Hundreds of thousands of people, mainly from Kwangtung (Guangdong) province, Shanghai and other commercial centres, entered during 1949 and the spring of 1950. By mid-1950, the population had reached an estimated 2.2 million. Population numbers have continued to grow: four million by 1971, five million by 1980, six million by 1994, and now over seven million.

The surge of people in the early 1950s led to a drastic increase in the number of squatters. A squatter fire left 53,000 people homeless on Christmas Day 1953, and the government responded with emergency rehousing measures, marking the start of the public housing programme. It has since developed into a comprehensive programme providing public rental housing and subsidised sale flats. In the fourth quarter of 2019, about 30 per cent and 15 per cent of the population were living in public rental housing and subsidised sale flats respectively.

Hong Kong started to industrialise to overcome economic stagnation caused by the United Nations' trade embargo on China in 1951 arising from the Korean war. No longer could the city rely solely on its port to provide prosperity for its swollen population. The rise of its manufacturing sector began with the setting up of textile mills. These expanded their range of products that, by the 1960s, included man-made fibres and garments. During this decade, textiles and clothing made up about half of domestic exports by value.

In 1966, as the Cultural Revolution began in the Mainland, tension mounted in Hong Kong. During 1967, this developed into a series of civil disturbances, affecting all aspects of life and temporarily paralysing the economy. The disturbances were contained by the year's end and the community resumed its tradition of peaceful progress.

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