Early HK Chinese manufacturers 1870s + around WW1

Hugh Farmer: These two extracts provide a clear indication of the range of manufacturing and products produced by Chinese in Hong Kong at two periods. It would be of interest to hear a little about some of these goods.

“While the expatriate investors set up all the major industrial enterprises , the Chinese community also went beyond handicraft industries and started building factories in the 1870s. The most important industries built by Chinese investors included a couple of factories for preserved ginger and other processed food, including traditional Chinese products like soy sauce and preserved fruits, a tannery, a few machine-makers, a paper factory and a match  manufacturer . On a smaller scale, numerous other workshops  run by the Chinese existed by the early 1880s. These included workshops for making cigars, tobacco, clothing, glass, oars, rifles, ropes, umbrellas, spectacles, tooth-powder and soap, as well as small factories for producing goods in bamboo and rattan.                   Steve Tsang  p61, A Modern History of Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press  2004

And somewhat later, around WW1 “Around the the time of WW1 “Older and smaller Chinese industries, such as camphor wood, preserved ginger, rattan, soap, soy sauce, tobacco and vermilion, continued to develop, but they no longer remained the primary focus for Chinese industrialists.”

John M Carroll  p86, A Concise History of Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press 2007