| Mweru-Luapula is a riverine area lying beween Zambia's Luapula Province and Zaire's Shaba Region. During the period between 1920 and 1964, this area became an important source of smoked and fresh fish to feed the urban population in Katanga and the Northern Rhodesian Copperbelt. The development and growth of the fishing industry attracted a continous flow of money to the fishery. And this money was either spent on consumer goods, saved or invested in gear, retail business, lorries, buses or brick-built houses. The fishing industry transformed what was economically a neglected area into one of the most developed rural area in either Katanga or Northern Rhodesia.;In studying the development and growth of the industry, the dissertation will trace the impact of the mining industry on the rural economies in the adjacent areas which included Mweru-Luapula. And in the analysis, the study will show the absorption of the fishery into the money economy and the area was gradually transformed into a "developed area.".;The methodological process which I used was of content analysis of the oral, archival and written data collected during research. The variables which emerged from the analysis were that the fishing industry provided an alternative to labor migration; a market for agricultural produce; assisted the development of ancillary industries and was a viable engine of rural development.;In approaching the study on a micro level, the dissertation succeeds in demonstrating the link between the mining economy and the fishing industry, something which, for this area, has not been adequately studied in the past.;In the study of rural development in Zambia or Zaire, emphasis has been on agriculture. Fishing as an industry, has never been regarded or considered as a viable rural industry. This oversight has created a wide gap in the understanding of the socio-economic history of the area. It is the objective of this study to narrow this gap and enable scholars to appreciate the importance of fishing as a viable industry. |
