With a concentration higher than 75 per cent in an only municipality, the provinces of Seville and Malaga monopolized between 1886 and 1959 the highest ratios of company constitutions, according to the work “An approach to the localization of the economic activity in Andalusia in the long period 1886-1959” published by professors Manuel Martín Rodríguez, Josean Garrués Irurzun and Salvador Hernández Armenteros in the book “The business register: a source for economic history” of the University of Granada.
For the authors of this study, published by the academic institution of Granada, “2,673 companies were created in Seville in this period, and 1,361 in Malaga, which are the 26.52 per cent and the 13,5 per cent, respectively, of the 10,077 companies set up in Andalusia.”
These two Andalusian provinces are followed, during the referred period, by Granada, Cadiz and Cordoba, with 682, 643 and 538 companies, respectively. However, according to the professors of the departments of Applied Aconomy and Theory of Economic History of the University of Granada, some of the big companies which developed their activity in Andalusia did not register in Andalusian registers, but in other Spanish provinces, especially in Madrid, Barcelona or Bilbao; or in other countries.
The company books the study is based on allow, according to the authors, “construct series of business activity with a level of desagregation of the information impossible to achieve through other channels. The qualitative information that can be obtained from deeds, despite its laboriousness, is of great interest, as it introduces as in the maze of relationships between companies and businessmen that take part in the different scenes of the Andalusian region.”
As regards Granada, the study emphasizes the role of the sugar subsector located in the division of Granada that, in the first decades of the 19th century, had its main centre in the area of Granada and its vega (fertile plain). According to Professor Martín Rodríguez “during this period the sugar subsector became a powerful pull for the economic growth of the area. In this case, the location of most of these companies should be connected both with the protectionist policy followed in this field by the governments of the Restoration and factors of comparative advantage of the areas where they were situated.”
Reference: Prof Manuel Martín Rodríguez.
Dpt of Applied Economics.
Phone number: 958 24 6188.
E-mail: mmartin@ugr.es
Prof José Ángel Garrues Irurzun. Dpt. of Economic theory and history. Phone number: 958 249913. E-mail: jgarrues@ugr.es
Prof Salvador Hernández Armenteros. Dpt. of Economic Theory and History. Phone number: 958 243720. E-mail: shdez@ugr.es
