Labour policy in a monocrop economy : the case of Mauritius

• Main Author: Lamusse, Roland
• Published: University of Warwick 1982
• Subjects: 331; HB Economic Theory
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.570315

Under the pressure of the population explosion amconstitutional changes, social and economic conditions in Mauritius went through a process of rapid change after the Second World War. The introduction of universal suffrage unseated the white plantocracy and brought to power the representatives of the urban and rural working classes. This led to fundamen~ changes in the Government social and economic policy. In 1963, Government fixed the wages and conditions of employment of agricultural and non-agricultural workers in the sugar industry. The first chapter describes the structure of the industry and the organisation of cane production on sugar estates. We study the pattern of land owPership characterised by the high concentration of cane land on millers' estates. The distribution of land will influence the rate of production and the allocation of resources inside the industry and the demand for and supply of labour on estates. In the second chapter we study the Island's social system and its influence on Government labour policy. The forces which led to the Government intervention in the labour market originated in the social structure of the Mauritius plantation economy with its rigid divisions. This accounts for the underdevelopment of industrial relations which prompted direct Government intervention in labour matters. The third chapter concentrates on the impact of Government regulations on the level of wages in the economy. The first part focusses on the importance of the sugar industry as a wage leader. We then study the effect of Government policy on the structure of wages and finally its influence on the distribution of employment. The analysis of the macro-economic structure forms an essential part of the work. The fourth chapter comprises a detailed quantitative description of the structure of the Island economy, which provides a convenient framework for the study of the effects of wage increases on the Government finances and the Balance of Payments. The fifth chapter is divided into two parts. In the first part we analyse the labour conditions on millers' estates through an investigation of the conditions of demand for and supply of labour. The second part provides an estimate of the marginal productivity of field labour during the crop and intercrop by means of production functions fitted to 1965 and 1973 data, in order to assess the effect of Government labour policy on the productivity of labour on estates.