www.mesc.gov.ws/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/History-Year-12.pdf Non-European Migrants
The two main groups of non-European migrants to Sämoa in the nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries were Chinese and Melanesians, whom the German
administration recruited in their homelands to come as contract labourers. In the
late 1800s, Europeans realised that the land and the climate on some of the larger
islands of the Pacific was suitable for crops that could not be grown in the colder,
temperate climates of Europe. These crops were: coconuts (for copra and coconut
oil), cotton, sugar cane, coffee, rubber, cocoa, and rice. Such agricultural products
were in high demand in countries such as Great Britain, France, Germany and the
Netherlands.
Growing these crops commercially takes large tracts of land, and is often labour
intensive. In tropical locations, commercial crops of coconuts, cocoa and sugar are
grown on plantations. In the late 1800s, German companies in Sämoa set up large
cocoa and coconut plantations, but local Sämoan people were not interested in
working on them. So the German companies recruited labour from overseas (China
and the Solomon Islands) and brought indentured (contracted) labour to Sämoa.
Melanesians, as young as fourteen, were recruited from Bougainville, Malaita and
the Bismarck Archipelago and brought to Sämoa by the Godeffroy and Sohn
company. They were expected to work on Sämoan plantations for three years before
they could return to their home islands with a box of goods. These goods were a
source of pride and status when they returned to their home communities.
