ABSTRACT
The Second World War was to prove a great watershed in the history of United Plantations and Bernam Oil Palms, but its outbreak in September 1939 had little immediate impact on estate managers and workers in Malaya. The theatres of war seemed far away; and while all the European staff of United Plantations and Bernam Oil Palms had been members of the Federated Malay States Volunteer Force since 1936, the outbreak of war made little difference to their settled routine of monthly exercises. Meanwhile, there continued to be a strong overseas demand for plantation produce. Trading patterns within Europe itself soon began to change, but this had only a small effect on the prices paid in Malaya. In October 1939 the British Ministry of Food began to requisition all supplies of palm oil from the Malayan pool at a fixed price. Singapore prices fell as a result from the 1938 average of £14 per tonne to a 1939 average of £11 before rising again to £13 in 1940. This meant a slight dip in Bernam Oil Palms’ gross profit margin, from 54 per cent of sales revenue in 1938 and 1940 to 50 per cent in 1939; but it in no way threatened the survival of the firm, and at Ulu Bernam itself, palm oil production continued unabated.1
