A 'clique of insignificant cockies'?: An Agricultural Association in the Tropics

Abstract

<p>By 1914 a group of selectors on the Herbert River in north Queensland had transformed the industrial and social landscapes of tropical Australia in a way that had not been possible in other colonial sugar growing areas of the world. In Australia, historians have overlooked small sugar cane farmers' associations, despite a broader scholarship identifying the contribution of small farmer associations to the demise of plantation production and the development of farm-based central milling. This article fills a gap in historical understandings of the development and significance of agricultural associations in the Australian sugar industry by examining the critical role they played as providers of extension services and as lobby groups. It argues that north Queensland small sugar farmers' associations have a unique place in global sugar industry history and were instrumental in displacing the plantation complex in tropical Australia.</p>