Copper and Foreign Investment: The development of the mining industry in Cyprus during the great depression

Alexander Apostolides

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: This paper evaluates the impact of the rapid growth of mining on the Cypriot economy during the period 1921-1938, with special focus on the expansion of copper sulphate mining. During this period the industry was transformed by companies such as the Cyprus Mining Corporation (CMC) and this affected the whole economy and society. The island was for the first time inundated with substantial foreign direct investment, which encouraged technological adaptation and altered labour relations; as such there has been a debate on how beneficial was mining for the economy at that time. Using substantial primary data we estimated output (GDP share), employment and productivity estimates for the mining industry, as well as profit estimates for the foreign mining firms through the use of a counterfactual. The data allows us to argue that mining was very beneficial in increasing labour productivity and earning foreign exchange, but also highlights that the economic and social benefits for the economy were less than those suggested by the colonial authorities due to mass exports of profits.

Keywords: Cyprus; Interwar Economics; Mining; Cyprus Mining Corporation (CMC); Rio Tinto (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: L72 N14 N54 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-04-11, Revised 2012-05-13
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/38758/2/MPRA_paper_38758.pdf original version (application/pdf)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/43211/1/MPRA_paper_43211.pdf revised version (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:38758

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany Ludwigstraße 33, D-80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joachim Winter ().