Why did Montserrat’s plantation system decline after 1834?

The plantation system on Montserrat declined following the abolition of slavery in 1834 due to two primary factors: the end of the enslaved labor force and a concurrent decrease in the price of sugar on world markets.1

Following this decline, the Montserrat Company, established in 1857 under the direction of Joseph Sturge, played a significant role in the island's transition by purchasing abandoned estates, encouraging the cultivation of limes, and selling land plots to settlers, which helped establish the smallholdings that characterize much of the island today.1