Plastics in the traditional rural portuguese society

Abstract

This article is part of a larger project that addresses the onset of industrial production of plastics in Portugal. The main objective is to study the two companies that pioneered plastic industrial production in Portugal at the beginning of the 1930’s, (one of these companies was connected with the electric sector and the other addressed basic needs of the Portuguese society) and try to evaluate the position that each of these companies occupied in the economic, politic and social scenarios of that time. The article further aims to analyze the evolution of the national plastic industry since its inception until the mid 1950’s, at which time plastic industrial production begins to be controlled, guided, and regulated by the Grémio Nacional dos Industriais de Composição e Transformação de Matérias Plásticas. However, although this corporative organization implements and subjects the sector to a transformation of its industrial structure.