Part III: COSUP and UNSTO Take Over
In 1942 the dire air-raid conditions required not only a drastic increase in rationing and the establishment of the Victory Kitchens, but also the direct management of unloading operations. By June, the unloading and storage of these goods became the responsibility of UNSTO as subcontractors of the COSUP. This was a centralised organisation of labourers replacing each pool’s and the shipping agents’ logistical efforts to unload ships and transport their supplies to Government stores, despite the pools’ protestations. Formed in 1942, its name directly translates into ‘unloading’ and ‘storage’. UNSTO was part of the reorganisation efforts in the unloading of convoys following the destruction of the SS Talabot and Pampas in the harbour along with most of their invaluable supplies in March 1942. UNSTO’s first action was in Operation Harpoon; the convoy which arrived in Malta in June. UNSTO would later provide effective service in the critical August convoy.
The creation of UNSTO was also a direct reaction to issues with the pools’ logistics in matters concerning reports of theft, damage and loss of stock due to mishandling, and other contraventions of established regulations, albeit to some extent such problems persisted even after UNSTO was established. Flour falling into the harbour during unloading was one such instance, among the aforementioned. However, issues persisted such as the uncleanliness of some stores and improper stacking causing losses in stocks or unhygienic storage. It is worth mentioning that a salvage store was established to save as much as possible from flawed stocks, including the much larger quantity of goods damaged enroute to Malta when ships were hit and/or flooded. If the state of stored food was doubtful, a medical officer would inspect it before distribution by the F.C.C.O., but spoiled food would be forwarded to the Agricultural Department as animal feed unless it was necessary to dispose of it outrightly.
When local stocks of imports became entirely COSUP and UNSTO responsibility to store and distribute, a major problem for local insurers emerged. The stocks previously in custody of the pools and stored in their warehouses were insured for fire and theft with the Fire and Burglary Insurance Agents’ Corporation: an organisation made of the leading local insurance agents. Once COSUP took over due to the conditions of war in 1942 the pools became defunct. Much to the Chamber’s horror, the pools system was terminated, with COSUP citing the critical need to maximise efficiency in the organisation of convoys and their allocated space. More so, the Maltese Government and COSUP decided not to retain any insurance cover. To lower prices as much as possible, the risk was taken over by the Government directly until pools were left to self-administer again and choose whether to reactivate their insurance policies or not. Some categories of imports remained the sole responsibility of the COSUP to which they never acceded to the Insurance Agents’ Corporation’s request to insure.
Disassembling the logistical chain
After 1943, Pools were gradually given back the responsibility for unloading and storing their goods and the profit commission was raised to 5%. The Chamber of Commerce would later argue for adequate shares of profits between different pools as the operating costs got higher, especially when the pools had to organise their own transport for their stocks in 1944. More so, that if any commodity was no longer imported, members of the respective pool would continue to receive its proportionate share of lost profit. Thus, the commissioned pool system preserved the local commercial ecology even if the imports fluctuated.
The resumption of commercial shipping in June 1944 shrunk COSUP’s role back to the coordination of individual orders and civilian supplies. With the capitulation of Italy in September 1943 the Mediterranean was cleared up for the free movement of Convoys, removing the biggest threat which COSUP was established to address. By 1944 pools started being dissolved, eventually being replaced by the pre-war system of imports under licence. However convoys were still unloaded every day, even on Sundays (somewhat forcibly), with the cessation of unloading at night. In 1945, 366 stores previously requisitioned were released, “at the rate of one a day.” Coal, oil, and fuel would be co-ordinated by the Navy and COSUP responsible to ensure the supply of some civilian imports and controlling their cost of living through subsidies. Nevertheless, COSUP was also involved in the re-establishment of civilian commercial ties to Italy and the Middle East.
In 1945 the rationed essential commodity pools would be reconstituted into the Combined Essential Commodity Pools as they were before, thanks to a scheme proposed by Farsons’ Lewis Farrugia (also referred to as the ‘Farrugia Scheme’). This comes after the Chamber’s considerable efforts to bring back free trade, meaning that firms were to be allowed to import and sell their products without pools and in competition with each other, unless their imports were subject to rationing or subsidies. In 1946 a re-organisation of commission rates for non-essential commodity pools was published until eventually the pools were slowly dissolved. According to Carmel Vassallo, the major success of the pools was the survival of the “pre-war commercial structure.” This is, perhaps, to the credit of the Maltese Government’s foresight to retain importers as distributors as opposed to nationalising the entire importation industry. To do so, they had to rely on exceptional men of unparalleled energy. These men created a marvel of a logistical system whose legacy lay in mountains of paperwork concerning orders for milk, kerosene, flour, and other things from the endless list of goods Malta needed to survive.
