GraceKennedy

On the next day, the Colonial Government in Jamaica acted to prevent profiteering. The Competent Authorities, in two separate Orders dealing with food supplies and with other articles, banned the exportation from Jamaica of comprehensive lists of foodstuffs and other goods, whether of local production or imported with intention to re-export. Only by special permission, applied for and given in writing, would any export of any of the articles listed be allowed under special permit issued by the relevant Competent Authority. In addition, a Foodstuff Prices Board would meet within a few days to fix prices and until then no price, whether who lesale or retail, should be marked up beyond those prevailing up to the end of August. Again, special cases for consideration would have to be addressed, in writing, to the Competent Authority. Any infringement of these regulations and any offer of goods above the prices to be set at intervals by the Government should be immediately reported to the Competent Authority, and those found in breach of the regulations would suffer 'severe penalties'.

Another regulation severely restricted the movement of ships and the showing of lights in any harbour, and banned any officially unauthorized agreement 'for indemnity, insurance or re- insurance' in respect of any vessel or any cargo leaving Jamaica.

Imports had also been regulated. Import licences had to be obtained, and importing firms, such as Grace, Kennedy, were allotted quotas based on their share of the market over the eighteen months prior to the outbreak of war. The trade in counter floor in which Grace, Kennedy had expanded now paid rich dividends. The Company was given a quota of about a quarter of the total import of that commodity. Quotas of other imports allotted to Grace, Kennedy also reflected the growth of their business since 1922. One other, worthy of particular mention because of its general consumption in town and country, was saltfish, for which Grace, Kennedy was given a 7% allocation of total import. There were also minor wartime windfalls. By the end of September 1939, there was a shortage of salt. The main source of supply had been Germany. That was now cut off. Domestic users, and the leather- making industry, which used large quantities in curing hides, found salt scarce and expensive. Merchants admitted to depleted stocks and rising prices. Grace, Kennedy had for some years been marketing small local and regional supplies including the solar salt from Pigeon Island, and so was already in a position to supply at least part of the island's needs.

On the export side, Grace, Kennedy, suffered less than those merchant firms by which Jamaican produce valued at over £5,000 - hides, coffee, pimento, divi-divi - had been exported to Germany shortly before the declaration of the war and had not yet been paid for, as was normally the case, with the exchange of goods from that country to be supplied in barter trade.

An idea of the prices of controlled items a few months after hostilities began is given in a list published at the beginning of April 1940. Maximum retail prices of selected goods were:

• Pickled Beef - English per lb. - 8 1/2d
• Pickled Beef - Australian per lb. - 9d
• Pickled Beef - American per lb. - 10d
• Red Peas per quart - 9d
• Cornmeal per lb. - 2d
• Codfish per lb. - 6d
• Coconut Oil, unrefined, per quart - 1s 6d
• Canadian Cheese per lb. - 1s 6d
• Baking and Counter Flour per lb. - 2 1/2d
• Mackerel per lb. - 4 1/2d
• Condensed Milk (varied according to brand, about) per tin - 7d -7 1/2d
• Pickled Pork per lb. - 9d
• Rice (according to source & quality) per lb. - 1 1/2d - 2 1/4d
• Soap, Imported per bar - 7 1/2d - 1s 1d
• Soap, Local per bar - 6d - 1s

[£1 = 20 shillings; 1 shilling = 12 pence (d); 1 penny = 4 farthings]

The rapid advances of the German armies through Europe soon dissipated early expectations of a short war. By the middle of 1941, only Russia and Britain stood in defiance of the German onslaughts. In the east, Russian armies fought desperately to hold off German advances; in the west, British naval and air forces waged unceasing battle against the growing menace of the German submarines. On the high seas, between mid-1940 and the end of 1941 the German U-boat fleets had inflicted increasingly severe losses on the British Merchant Marine. More than one-third of the total pre-war tonnage had been sunk. And, in the Far East, on December 6, 1941, a cablegram from Singapore informed the British High Command that Japanese warships and troop-transports were steaming westward. Next day, without declaration of war, Japanese land and naval forces attacked British Malaya and Hong Kong, and the Japanese air force blasted American warships in Pearl Harbour. By the start of 1942, the conflict was global. Here in Jamaica, the impact of wartime conditions seriously affected the merchant- firms. The submarine menace in the Atlantic severely diminished trade with Britain, and enemy control of continental ports put traditional European markets beyond reach. With the entry of Japan and the United States into the war, the situation worsened.

During the 1930s the banana trade accounted for over 50 per cent of the total value of visible exports. In 1937 a high mark of just under 27 million stems had been shipped; but the banana trade was a fragile base for the island's economy. Bananas are a perishable commodity. Wartime scarcity of suitable cargo-space, the irregularity of the arrival and departure of ships, and the slow, weaving passage under convoy in the attempt to evade the German submarines - all militated against the trade. So too did the fact that it was essentially a luxury trade. In wartime, transport systems, curtailed by enemy action, are concentrated on the movement of basic necessities and of men and supplies for battle.