Page 9 - Bahrain Gov Annual Reports (IV)_Neat

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GENERAL REVIEW

The total revenue in 1367 was 103 lakhs, (approximately £774,000) this
was 17 lakhs more than last year’s revenue. The oil royalty amounted to
Rs. 45,91,600 and receipts from Customs produced Rs. 1,000 more than the oil
royalty, the Customs collections were almost 11 lakhs higher than in the previous
year. Other revenue amounting to about 11 lakhs, showed an increase under
most headings.

The expenditure was 75\ lakhs and 6 lakhs were added to the Reserve
Fund whose face value at the end of the year was 173 lakhs.

Throughout the year the country enjoyed great prosperity; trade, apart
from the diving industry, was flourishing, merchants continued to import large
quantities of goods from both Sterling and Dollar areas for consumption in Bahrain
and for re-export. At the end of the year however there were indications that a
limit had been reached in the quantity of certain types of commodities, especially
piece-goods, which could be absorbed by Bahrain and the neighbouring states.
In 1366 the Government spent Rs. 113 lakhs on buying food supplies which
it sold to the people of Bahrain. During the year under review it spent only 31
lakhs. The merchants were given the opportunity to resume their normal trade
and the Government hoped that doing away with controls and restrictions and
encouraging free commercial enterprise and competition would result in plentiful
supplies of food and no increase in the cost of living. The experiment was not a
success. Prices of imported food and local products rose sharply and the cost of
most necessities increased, although prices in Bahrain still remained lower than
elsewhere in the Gulf. Merchants made most of the opportunity, importers of
rice, which they bought with their own dollars, made enormous profits.
The country’s prosperity was reflected in the improvement in the standard
of living, more noticeable in the towns than in the villages. Public Health was
good, there was very little crime and the people in general appeared to be well fed
and contented. Visible signs of prosperity were the building of several large new
cinemas, which did a flourishing trade ; shops, even the little stalls in the suburbs
of towns and in the villages, were crammed with consumer goods, almost every
stone house in Manama contained a wireless set and all classes of the people
appeared better dressed, a large proportion of them carrying wrist watches
and fountain pens, though in many cases they could not use them. Local Arabs
embarked upon or had under consideration various projects such as hotels, print­
ing presses, ice plants, a lime plant and a tile factory.
Some of the prosperity was due to the money which was brought into the
country by Bahrain Arabs who earned their living abroad, mostly in Saudi Arabia,
where the scarcity of educated people provided opportunities for men who had
been through the Bahrain schools to obtain highly paid posts. Many unskilled
labourers as well left the country and worked for foreign oil companies and con­
tractors. This produced a shortage of labour in Bahrain which was filled by
numbers of Arabs from Oman and Persians, claiming to be resident on the Trucial
Coast, who poured into the country by illegal and legal means and obtained work