Civilian contract help please

[Michael Sandy (OP)]

So how exactly do I do these contracts?  I presume that I create a demand contract at the colony I want the stuff to go to, but do I need to create a matching supply contract somewhere else?

[davidb86]

Yes,  There must be a supply contract.  For example if you wanted the civilian line to ship mines from earth to mars, you would create a supply contract on Earth showing how many can be shipped and a matching demand contract on Mars.  If mars has been colonized, shipping the mines to mars would free up workers for other facilities on Earth.

[Michael Sandy (OP)]

Also, do civilian mining companies establish themselves on rocks that you DO have a colony on, or exclusively those you do NOT have a colony on?

[davidb86]

Asteroids with no colony (yours or others)

[MarcAFK]

The other thing to note is that civilian mines are only established on bodies with duranium or sorium. So I usually avoid mining those until after the civs have established mining colonies already.

[Michael Sandy (OP)]

Once they establish a mining colony, will they add to it if you do things like put an administrator on the colony?  Do civilian administrators boost the output of civilian mining complexes?

[MarcAFK]

Once you specifically purchase the output of the civ mines they're added to the colonys production, before other bonuses. So they get the benifit of administrators, production tech etc.
Civilians will also dump more mines onto the colonies, if you get the civilians started early the output from civ mines can generally be higher than what your own mines produce. at least from the sol systems.