Tobago’s transition after two world wars

Dr Rita Pemberton

The start of the 20th century seemed to offer much promise for Tobago. The sugar industry was completely dead, and the old planter and merchant class was no longer visible. There was a new class of landowners who were inclined to make maximum use of the island’s resources and engage in agricultural diversification; but without the required support from the central government, the much hoped for development did not occur.

It soon became evident that there was no increased prosperity in the offing from the new century.

There continued to be rumblings about the disadvantages to the island of union, and despite the fact that some members of the working class supported the petition for closer union, there was disappointment in the absence of any real benefits.

A group of new plantation owners, some from Trinidad and others from Grenada, who made their home in Tobago, sought to wring profits from their newly acquired estates. They continued to offer 19th-century wages to their workers, who had very few employment options.

The spiralling cost of living made life very difficult and the result was a marked movement of migrants.

The island was faced with a dysentery epidemic which took its toll on the communities in the north, centre and western areas and revealed the poor state of the sanitary infrastructure and the absence of a supply of potable water.

The outbreak of World War I in 1914 brought on its own additional stresses, with shortages of imported items and accompanying high prices. Post-war depression added further stresses, with additional increases in the cost of living without any compensatory increase in wages, which led to the outbreak of labour disturbances in 1919.

By 1929, organised labour took root. Starting in Bethel, branches of the Trinidad Workingmen’s Association were established across the island, and there were over 500 members of the organisation in that year.

Then came the crash of the cocoa industry in 1922. This resulted from the imperial decision to introduce cocoa cultivation to the Gold Coast (modern-day Ghana), which ousted Trinidad and commanded the world market for cocoa. Although Tobago’s small cocoa farmers continued in cultivation, labourers and cocoa contractors were negatively affected by reduced incomes.

The outbreak of World War II in 1939 led the imperial government to develop a food strategy as a part of its defence mechanism. The intent was to provide food for the population to defuse the protests that were evident in the larger island and reduce the extent of disaffection and militancy among workers in the united colony and prevent them from supporting communist ideals.

A Grow More Food Campaign, which offered increased prices for peasant-cultivated food, was introduced to ensure the colony had a supply of locally produced food, given the hazards to trade that were presented by the war. Guaranteed prices and sale for all items that were produced and conveniently located food-collection depots provided a great stimulus to food production and a new avenue for increased earnings for the local farming community.

While Trinidad experienced a food shortage, because food imports from the Eastern Caribbean were no longer available, Tobago was self- sufficient, and became an exporter of food to Trinidad. This situation did not last long, for as soon as the war was over, there was a return to the pre-war situation. The Grow More Food campaign was terminated, and the food depots and buying agents were closed and ceased operations as early as 1943.

The decline in Tobago’s agricultural sector continued unabated, as there also occurred a fall in coconut prices, and only one coconut estate survived into the post-war period.

There were accompanying social changes. The old class structure disappeared, as did the old planter and merchant class who rehadplaced the last remaining sugar planters at the start of the early 20th century. By the 1930s none was visible.

Tobago’s commercial sector became dominated by migrant Syrian/Lebanese and Chinese businessmen, and as the island turned to tourism, the investors and managers of this sector came to form the dominant class. The old coloured middle class migrated and was replaced by an educated group including teachers, public servants and small landowners.

There was no change in status for the majority of the working class, for whom low-wage employment continued to be the main offering. These workers had to supplement their earnings with subsistence agriculture, skilled trades and small businesses to support their families.

With little hope for positive change in circumstances on the horizon and with the very limited educational facilities on the island, migration continued to be heavy. There was a consistent flow of migrants from Tobago east to the west, and from Tobago to Trinidad. In addition, some sought employment opportunities in Cuba, Venezuela, Maracaibo (Venezuela) and Panama.

Some families benefited from the earnings of their migrant relatives, for many of them were able to purchase significant parcels of land, but migration had its social costs. The traditional village and social structure were undermined, village cohesion was reduced, as there was a loosening of family and community ties, and the migrants who relocated to urban spaces were prone to cultural erosion. World Wars I and II demarcated a significant period in the history of Tobago. It was an era of challenge, social change and population redistribution which reduced the size of the island’s human-resource base.