1. Asian Labour and settlement
From late 19th century, European plantations were looking for cheap and reliable labour and there was not enough labour nearby from the islands such as Melanesia to meet this demand. Therefore they began to search for labour from Asia.
Chinese and Indian labourers were brought to work in Pacific islands and their descendants formed migrant communities in their new home countries. Therefore the search for labour began from Asia. Chinese communities had settled in almost every major island group in the South Pacific and Indian settled especially in Fiji.

2. Waves of Chinese Migrants
1. Even before the first wave, Chinese entered the South Pacific at the end of the eighteenth century as cooks and carpenters on ships seeking sandalwood and bêche-de-mer, although no Chinese settled in the islands until the 1840s. They arrived in the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu) in 1844 and in New Caledonia in 1846, but there are no descendants of these firstcomers among the current Chinese populations of these islands. It was the resolute traders, who followed them after the middle of the nineteenth century who became the first Chinese settlers in the South Pacific. 2. Following the advent of Chinese traders in various islands, Chinese indentured labour (huagong) was imported in fairly large numbers into French Polynesia (Tahiti and the Marquesas) from 1865, German New Guinea from 1891, German Samoa from 1903, and Nauru and Banaba (Ocean Island) from Third wave of Chinese migration to the Pacific began during the period between the wars, when all these countries except Tonga were French, British, Australian, or New Zealand territories. In six of them (French Polynesia, Western Samoa, Fiji, the New Hebrides, the Solomon Islands, and Papua New Guinea), huaqiao communities developed that included the Chinese wives and children of traders. The presence of these organised communities provided the opportunity for part-Chinese children of Chinese labourers to participate as Chinese.

3. Why did the Chinese come to the Pacific?
Ming dynasty of China fell in 1640s and Manchu invaded. Many Chinese refused to submit to Manchu rule and retreated to Taiwan and many of their descendants became the first Chinese in the Pacific.
Manchu established itself in China and regarded overseas Chinese as traitors who could be punished by execution.
They even issued decree that prohibited Chinese immigration and the decree remain in force upto 19th century. Thus tensions between China and Chinese communities outside remain intact untill the fall of Manchu dynasty in 1911.
There was also dissatisfaction in China with colonial powers like British, France, US, Germany and others who scramble the China for trade and control over China.
During the beginning of 19th century, China was devastated by unemployment inadequate housing, poverty, famines and natural disasters. These conditions forced people to response to demand of labour in foreign lands where they can earn money for themselves and their families and even settle in foreign land. They mostly came from highly density population areas. They intend to make quick money and return home but many made foreign land as their new home

4. Where did the Chinese go in the Pacific?
Chinese mostly went to Australia and New Zealand. The convict settlement of New South Wales provided cheap labour for early settlers in Australia. But when British shipment of convict labour stopped in 1840, the settlers turned to Chinese labour.
In 1851, with the beginning of gold rush era, Chinese migrants began to arrive, and after 3 years, there were about 2000 Chinese in Australia state of Victoria.
Similarly, Chinese went to South island of New Zealand during 1860s. Many among them arrived there after working in Australia and some came directly from China. But series of immigration Acts reduced Chinese number in 1907.

5. Where did the Chinese go in the Pacific?
German administration in PNG, introduced the first Chinese indentured labourers. Between , many Chinese labourers came but they were repatriated. Some Chinese labourers worked in Nauru for the British Phosphate Company before WWI.
After the depletion of Australian goldmines, many Chinese return back home while some on their way back travelled to Fiji and found employment. But untill they arrived, Indian Indentured labourers had taken all the work available under British administration, Thus most of the Chinese who stayed in Fiji remained as free settlers. They usually ran small business activities and many found work in Levuka.

6. Samoan Chinese
When Samoa became colonized by German as a Colony, on 1st March 1900, many labour came from Western Samoan Trust Estates Corporation and the company got its labour from Melanesia. Other entrepreneurs also invested in plantation and generated demand for labour.
Therefore, German administration send a delegation to Chinese emperor to begin negotiations of labourers. After several negotiations, 289 Chinese arrived in Samoa as indentured labourers in 1903 and mostly from the provinces of Fujian and Guandong.

7. Samoan Chinese
Scholars like Nancy Toms stated the conditions under which the labourers were recruited.
The planters had to pay some money in advance for each coolie.
There was 3 year contract period and after that the labourer has to be repatriated with the employer paying the costs.
Wages were 10 German marks per month
if the number of arrivals was fewer than the total number that the planters had ordered, the number of coolie allocated to each planter was decreased.
Planters who needed loans for recruitment cost had to apply immediately to the government.

8. Four categories of Chinese migration
Certainly the Chinese who came into the South Pacific in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were very different from the most recent wave that began in the 1980s.
Professor Wang has categorised Chinese migration over the last two centuries as falling into four patterns.
The first and most persistent pattern is huashang, or traders, those who went abroad to seek commercial opportunities.
Later in the nineteenth century another type emerged, huagong, or overseas worker, most of them contracted to non-Chinese companies.
Then huaqiao, or sojourner, appeared in the first half of the twentieth century and established communities with continuing connections to the motherland, often including both huashang and huagong.
Now a new phenomenon has emerged in the past three decades, that of the huayi. This fourth pattern comprises those of Chinese ancestry who are no longer tied to their motherland but move rather freely in the global economy, re-migrating to take advantage of new opportunities.

9. Indians in Pacific
Genrally, Indian in Pacific is referred to the ones belonging to ethnic heritage is from India, Pakistan or Bangladesh.
It is generally believed that Pacific idnian came to Fiji first, but historically, in 1864, a group of planters left the French colony of Reunion, an island in the Indian Ocean to move to New Caledonia. These planters brought the first group of Indian labourers to work in the Pacific.

10. Indian indentured labourers in New Caledonia
Indians began to work in Reunion under the service agreement. They worked for a long time on Reunion plantations, and the planters considered them as excellent labourers due to their hard work and family people. In Reunion, they were called Malabars after the Malabar coastal region in India and many kept this name in New Caledonia on the sugar-cane plantations.

11. Origin of Indian indentured labour
The origin of Indian indentured labour also known as coolies in British colonies can be traced to the abolition of slavery in the British Empire by the Act of Emancipation of The emancipation of slaves in led to severe shortage of labourers working in sugar, coffee, tea, cocoa, and rice and rubber plantations in the colonies. The plantation owners worldwide succeeded in bringing pressure on the British colonial authorities in introducing the system of indentured Indian immigration based at Calcutta and Madras. Indians at that time were employed in public works: roads, harbours, offices and jails in various colonies.

12. Indian Indentured labourers in Fiji
From early 1870s, the Cakobau government made the first attempt to introduce Indian labourers to Fiji. A growing number of European settlers were trying to grow cotton as cotton industry of United States was weakening and created a gap in market.
Despite Fiji having enough Fijian workers to supply the necessary labour, the settlers successfully pressured the Cakobau government into asking for labourers from India in But it was blocked by British government in India.
In 1874, Fiji became the British colony and the attitude began to change. Sir Arthor Gordon was opposed to Fijians working for wages esp. outside their traditional rural surroundings and he introduced measures to keep Fijians in their villages.

13. Indian Indentured labourers in Fiji
Thus, he faced labour problem and in 1875 a measles epidemic had spread in Fiji and killed one third of indigenous population. Thus it was a problem to revive the Fiji’s economy.
Cotton industry of US recovered and settled were encourage to develop copra and sugar. But these enterprises require huge labour force.
Under these circumstances, Gordon authorized the importation of Indian labourers under 5 years indenture system. After the end of 5 years, the Indians were free to return home at their own expenses and if they chose to remain for the second term, the Fiji government would pay their passage home at the end of that term, or thy could then choose to remain in Fiji. Brij V Lal’ research Girmityas: The Origins of the Fiji-Indians had studied their origin by examining immigration passes which indentured labourer had to have in order to come to Fiji.

14. Indian Indentured labourers in Fiji
In 1879, five years after the Deed of Cession was consummated, an event occurred which, as years went on, was to change the whole economic, social and political situation in Fiji. That was the importation of indentured labourers from India to Fiji. The first batch of 481 Indian indentured labourers landed in Fiji on 14th May 1879.
From 1879 to 1919 there was a steady immigration of Indians to Fiji. The immigrants included both indentured and unindentured labourers. They were recruited under the supervision of the Government of India.

15. Indian Indentured labourers in Fiji
The Indians who immigrated to Fiji came from various parts of the subcontinent. The majority were northerners especially from the United Provinces. For the first decade or so following 1879, immigration was slow, but it gathered momentum during the 1890's. At the turn of the century, immigration to the colony increased still further, as labour was in demand because of the expansion of the sugar industry. There was a constant stream of immigrants, and by 1912, Indians in Fiji numbered around 50,000.

16. Recruitment of labourers
In India, the entire method of recruitment of the indentured labourers was very unpopular. The recruiters roamed about the country, using all manner of fraud to attain their object. The prospective emigrant had to testify before a magistrate that he understood the terms of the contract. Unscrupulous methods were used including lying, kidnapping by the recruiting men to dupe ignorant country folk in order to get them to offer themselves for indenture.8 The immigration of labourers from India, other than under contract, had been subject to very little government control or interference.

17. Conditions of the Coolies
The conditions of the coolies in Fiji especially on the cane plantations were pitiable. Merciless overseers and corrupt sirdars made miserable. The tasks assigned to the coolies depended of the overseers or their extortionate tactics. The coolies were accommodated in long sheds, partitioned into ten feet by seven feet cubicles, within which the system of indentured labour was practiced on the old 'slave' estates.
Indian coolies have high death rate and suicide cases. coolies. The feeling of being bound to serve for a fixed period and in the same estate often drove a coolie to commit suicide who was already depressed by homesickness, jealousy, domestic unhappiness or any other cause. Even if indentured labour was abolished, the effect of unusual surroundings, inability to return to India at will or other causes maintained the suicide rate above the normal figures.

18. Conditions of the Coolie
The normal conditions among the coolies in Fiji was a matter of concern to the families of the immigrants and authorities. Sexual immorality among the indentured labourers was due to immigration of more men than women. This shortage of women led to sharing of women, which amounted to legal prostitution. The disproportion among males and females affected both indentured and free labour. Many a times the immigrants included prostitutes, social outcastes or those who had been unhappy in their domestic relations.
There were frequent prosecutions and punishments such as extension of indenture or imprisonment for offences against the Labour Ordinances
The only bright side of otherwise gloomy and miserable picture of the life of the coolies in Fiji was that they earned better wages compared to other colonies. The average number of days worked by the coolies in Fiji was higher than in other colonies. This was chiefly due to the healthy climate, better sanitary conditions and the variety of work with its slack and busy seasons during the latter of which they could earn higher wages. Repatriation from Fiji were comparatively few due to better wages.

19. Campaign against Indenture Labour
There was a growing feeling of indignation and shame in India against the indentured labour in British Colonies including Fiji. Indian nationalist leaders, moderates and extremists alike considered that the existence of this system was 'slavery' and considered it as the stigma of 'helotry'.

20. Indian immigration continued after end of indenture labour
Following the end of the indentured labour, immigration from India continued. The agricultural people who came during the early part of the immigration were followed at intervals in later years by an entirely different type. Among them were Gujaratis, who came at their own expense. They emigrated because they could earn a better living in Fiji than in Gujarat. They were traders, tailors, shoemakers, barbers, laundrymen and jewellers. Following the Gujaratis came people from the Punjab who were peasant farmers and dairymen. The majority were Sikhs from Ludhiana and Jullund.
Though Indian emigrants could not easily own land in Fiji, they gradually began to have a grip on the Fijian economy through various professions and control of merchandise, shops and business ventures. Indians were also numerous in the middle levels of bureaucracy.