Against the Grain : British Food Security Policy and Colonial Authority in South-East Asia 1945-1948

This thesis examines the role of food security and famine relief in British efforts to reassert their colonial authority in South-East Asia after the Second World War. In the immediate period after the conflict had ended, the British found themselves responsible for the rehabilitation of an area which had been devastated by Japanese occupation. Famine had already caused many civilian deaths in French Indochina and the Netherlands East Indies and the British sought to prevent further famine in their own colonies of Malaya and Singapore. Maintaining control of these two economically and strategically important territories became a priority for Britain and keeping them supplied with food was a key feature of British efforts to restore their power in South-East Asia. To achieve this objective, the British adopted a regional strategy to managing food shortages. This thesis analyses British efforts to improve food production in Malaya and Singapore but also its attempts to assert control over an international system of food distribution and its policies of rice procurement in Siam (Thailand), Burma, French Indochina (Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos) and the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia). This thesis argues that in taking such a transnational and transcolonial approach to dealing with rice shortages in South-East Asia, the British undermined their overall objective of restoring their own colonial authority. While able to prevent famine in Malaya and Singapore, coping with a regional food crisis in South-East Asia brought the British into direct contact with local and also international actors which were increasingly opposed to the continuance of imperial rule.