Rice in Malaya

6. The Northern Centre: Perak

The Northern Centre: Perak 105 6 The Northern Centre: Perak The principal products of the state are tin, rice and ratans. T.J. Newbold, 1839, 2, 23 The country is remarkably populous, and abounds in Campongs of fruit and other trees. Paddy is grown in sufficient quantities to meet the requirements of the population… J.W.W. Birch, 1874, SDT 14.5.1874 Although the name “Perak” means silver, it was not silver but tin which was the major product (Wray, 1886). In this respect Perak was unlike its northern neighbours. Some degree of regional self-sufficiency in rice probably existed, though this is a question upon which it is difficult to reach a firm conclusion because information is scanty. Nevertheless a few major facts can be ascertained, partly on the basis of Anderson’s report (Anderson, 1824, 169–90). Along the mangrove-bound coast, settlements existed only on terra firma at the heads of some of the major creeks. Rice may have been grown by shifting cultivation on the very limited areas of sand ridges in the vicinity of these settlements, as Sinclair was to report in 1877 (ST 25.8.1877), but the main rice areas were some distance away. The deltaic tracts, some four or five feet above high tide mark, were virtually uninhabited. The large tract between the Sepitang and the Krian rivers was uninhabited except for a line of villages on or near the Krian river.1 105 1 At this time the southern boundary of Province Wellesley lay along the Krian river, on the Perak side of which lay several villages, containing Kedah refugees and their families, some 2,000 persons in all, growing rice. The largest village was at Bagan 106 Rice in Malaya Equally empty was the area between the Perak and Bernam rivers, except for a scattering of villages along the lower reaches of the Perak. In a similar state was a vast area of fresh-water swamp south of Bruas and west of the Perak river, a region largely unoccupied in the 1960s. Along the main valley of the Perak and its tributaries, closely hemmed in by the surrounding hills, lay the main settled area, a straggle of villages on the river terraces and in the upper delta, on the levees. Two concentrations of settlement existed, one in the vicinity of Bandar and Rantau Panjang in the lower Perak valley, and a smaller one near Kuala Kangsar. Of these centres, the latter, in the delta, was probably not of much agricultural significance, if the modern lack of rice-growing in this vicinity is any criterion. The smaller centre was an area of permanent rice cultivation. Away from the main valley were two minor centres of wet rice cultivation, one in the north around Selama, and the other far to the south at Slim on the Bernam. For the rest, shifting cultivation, by Malays as in Kinta, or Patani folk as in Upper Perak or by aborigines as in the eastern hills and mountains, was the ruling mode of culture. The piedmont zone, including the Kinta, Batang Padang and Tanjong Malim districts, was rich in tin and extended beyond the state boundary into Selangor to form part of a broad “march zone” in which rice-growing was mostly of little significance. This region is discussed in Chapter 8. Most of the State would seem to have been more or less self-sufficient with probably some surplus in some years. On the other hand, Malcom claimed that little land was cultivated and that the inhabitants depended upon the sale of tin and on fishing for the purchase of rice (Malcom, 1839, 103–4; Newbold, 1839, 2, 22ff). CHANGES PRIOR TO INTERVENTION Apart from the devastation of civil war which most seriously affected the Larut area, this pattern of agriculture and settlement was little changed in the period down to British intervention. Immediately following the transfer of the Krian area from Kedah to Perak administration, the Kedah rice growers who had settled there during the Siamese invasion removed to Kedah leaving the area almost desolate (SFP 3.5.1849). To the south it was possible that Tiang (see Asst. Res. Councillor to Res. Councillor, Penang, 7.2.1848; Gov. to Fort William, 12.2.1848, EIC Board’s Coll.). Butterworth, however, gave a population of only 300 in 1847 (Gov. to Fort William, 23.6.1847, EIC Board’s Coll.). The Province boundary was shifted to its present location under the terms of...