Committee for Economic Development of Australia, 1958-1970

Component identifier:

Series 64

Content Summary:

Modelled on overseas committees fostering economic development, the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (C.E.D.A) was formed in Melbourne by Copland in 1960. He was Chairman of its Board of Trustees until 1966 and maintained an interest in its activities and contact with its leaders as their Economic Consultant up to 1970.

Series 64 contains a great deal of material on Copland and C.E.D.A. Broadly speaking, it has been arranged into Executive Committee records, memoranda and correspondence, individual files relating to specific subjects, and a group of C.E.D.A. and other publications. The first group also includes cuttings, press releases, lists of C.E.D.A Trustees, notes of interviews, addresses by Directors, drafts of articles by Copland, reports of overseas trips by Directors such as R.L.S. Starling, minutes and agenda. Conferences C.E.D.A. participated in or helped organise are also documented here, including the Asian Conference on Industrialisation, Manila, 1965, Women at Work, Melbourne, 1966, and an International Congress on Human Relations, Melbourne, 1965.

The second group of individual files covers topics such as Dr H. Giells, Ford Foundation, visit of J. Douglas Gibson, Taxation Department, Copland's visits, Committee for Economic Development (U.K), C.E.D.A. current research studies, and South east Asian study. Here too are separate files of correspondence that Copland kept with particular C.E.D.A. officials such as John A. Pitt, R.H. Harding, and K.W. Taylor. Files of general C.E.D.A. correspondence, filed alphabetically, have also been preserved. These cover mainly 1958-1961 and 1964-1966 and include letters from Sir Warren McDonald, W.D. Borrie, D.H. Merry, P. Grey, John P. Young, A.J. Keast, Sir Maurice Mawby, G.S. LeCouteur, Sir Essington Lewis, J. McEwen, S.M. Gilmore, and K.W. Taylor.

The final group, printed material, comprises issues from C.E.D.A. Supplementary Papers and Occasional Papers, i.e. Memoranda for Trustees, Annual Reports, Growth, Statements of policy (P Series), and from its Monograph Series (reports of C.E.D.A. sponsored research). There are also a small number of publications of the British Committee for Economic Development.

Immediate source of acquisition:

Lady Copland presented the personal papers of Sir Douglas Copland to the National Library in September 1973. Additions to the collection were received from the Copland Family between 1977 and 1981.

Names:

Copland, D.B. (Douglas Berry), 1894-1971

Access and use