ABSTRACT
Peterhead has changed; most obviously the town is physically much larger than it was in 1970. Much of the economic activity stimulated by oil was construction work in the erection of landfall facilities, jetties, warehousing and domestic housing. Large national firms were employed to undertake this work, but they provided jobs for local workers and subcontracts for local building firms. Peterhead was more a commodity than a community to its users and this was most strikingly illustrated by land speculation. The sole objective was to make profit by buying cheap and selling dear without regard to the local consequences. The main activity entailing oil and gas themselves in or near Peterhead was neither processing nor manufacture, but transshipment. Underdevelopment in a third-world country entails severe and often long-term exploitation.
