EMPA – THE BRIEF HISTORY

It was on the 26th October 1889 that the tobacco planters of the East Coast met together in Sandakan to form a Planters Association. The purpose – then as now – was to discuss plantation problems, to represent estate interest to the Government and to co-operate with the Government on matters of mutual interest. The records of the Association were lost during the Japanese occupation. Therefore, it was impossible to make a detailed account of the early history of the Association. The little that is known is gleaned mainly from the surviving copies of the official North Borneo Herald.

The original Association represented only the tobacco planters of the Kinabatagan, Segaliud Labuk and Sugut; but early in the 1890s, when rubber planting had superceded tobacco as the dominant crop, the Association was re-founded as the Planters Association of the West Coast with its headquarters in Jesselton. In the 1920s it became the North Borneo Planters Association and since then has represented all or nearly all, the principal estates on both East and West Coast of Sabah. In 1963 when North Borneo achieved Independence and confederated with Peninsular Malaysia, the Association changed its name to Sabah Planters’ Association. Ten years later the name of the Association was changed to the East Malaysia Planters’ Association (EMPA) when plantation development activities in Sarawak began on a commercial scale.

The Association is said to be one of the oldest, if not the oldest planters’ association that is still in operation in the world today. In the last century, the plantation industry has changed the livelihood and fate of many persons and significantly improved the economic well being of the State. This could not have been achieved without the sacrifice of many planters who devoted their lives to the Association and the industry.

In the early years, two men featured most prominently. The first was Mr. F.E.Lease. Before transferring to the West Coast in 1898 to open up Sapong Estate he was the Manager of a tobacco estate on the Kinabatangan and he may well have been a founder member of the original Association. He was known to be the Secretary of this Association as early as 1892 and that as late as 1927 he was Chairman of the North Borneo Planters’ Association.

The other who is well remembered is Mr. R.K. Hardwick. In 1913 when he was the Manager of Membakut Estate, he accepted the post of Secretary of the Association and in later years he was several times its Chairman.

It was men like Lease and Hardwick who with a strong sense of purpose and courage in the face of tremendous obstacles, created the plantation industry in North Borneo; and Sabah and Sarawak are indebted to them. Since then of course there have been many notable planters, too numerous to mention them all in a brief account. However Datuk R.G. Barrett, Datuk J.R. Baxter, Mr. N. Kingsley-Pallant, Tungku Mansur Yaacob and Mr. L. Davidson immediately spring to mind.