Trade

• Singapore

  • 1819 =400K Spanish Dollars; 1824= 2700% increase trade; 1824 = 11 million Spanish Dollars; 1846 = 20 British merchant houses.
  • 1813 Charter Act = EIC lost monopoly in India; desire trade with China; opium/rice/silk.
  • Governor of Canton strict; UK opium traders restricted to Canton; forced to trade with Hongs; Dutch shipping and piracy posed a threat to UK traders.
  • Sir Stamford Raffles; captured Java from Dutch; 1819 founded Singapore w/o parliamentary approval; angered the Dutch.
• Shanghai

  • Treaty of Nanking; nicknamed 'unequal treaty'; China paid 6 million dollars for lost opium; 3 million debt repaid to UK traders; 12 million in war reparations; cede Hong Kong to UK.
  • Mouth of Yangtze River; allowed access 1000 miles into interior of China; global settlement with USA base in 1848 and France in 1849; businessmen set up Shanghai Municipal Council.
  • UK permanently stationed a steamer during Taiping Rebellion.
• Suez Canal

  • Overran budget by 233 million francs; in 1870 shipping was only 430K tons; in 1868 only 2% of UK trade to Asia was via steamships versus 60% or 6.5 million tons in Mediterranean and America.
  • 1868-74 = steam tonnage from Asia increased 168%; by 1874 = 3/4 of trade via Suez was British.
  • Acquisition; Disraeli borrows 4 mil from Roths; 'highway to our Indian Empire' = geopolitical reasons; Gladstone personal fortune.
• Zanzibar

  • Entrepot Model; slave-trading hub = 50k slaves in 1822; ivory trade; links to India and Oman; Britain applied pressure to stop slave trade = trade banned but slavery not banned until 1873.
  • Shipping grew from 1859-79 from 65 ships and 18k tons to 95 ships and 95k tons.
  • Competition from Karl Peters; German E Africa Comp. ;in 1884 Peters only collected 8740 dollars; Kaiser donated 25K to project.
  • British interests prevail; British E. Africa Association; raised 250K; never made money made 30K losses; funded railway building; Anglo-Zanzibar War led to 500 casualties for Zanzibar/ 0 UK.
• Mercantilism and Protectionism

  • In early 1800s, 15% of population owned and cultivated the land (protected by mercantilism).
  • Protectionist laws such as Hat Act 1732 and Iron Act 1750.
  • British debt grew due to 7 Years War, US War of Independence, Napoleonic Wars.
  • Navigation Acts 1786 barred US shipping from West Indies (out of fear that America could become too powerful).
  • Mercantilism and Protectionism had a symbiotic relationship with slavery, 40K slaves a year sent to West Indies from 1776-1786.
• 1807 Abolition of the Slave Trade

  • In 1798, the slaveship 'Lottery' made a profit of £12,000.
  • In the 1790s, 120-130 slaveships sailed from Liverpool annually.
  • In 1766, estimated that 40 MPs had financial backing from slave trade.
  • Average Bristolian owed 40% of their wealth to slavery.
  • Church of England owned a slave plantation in the West Indies.
  • Signs that slavery was inefficient: 1/10 slaveships lost profit, 1778 saw Liverpool merchants lose £700K.
  • 1789 = Wilberforce campaigns against slavery, abolitionism gains popularity as a patriotic idea because Napoleon reinstates slavery.
• Free Trade

  • Adam Smith advocates for free trade in 'The Wealth of Nations'.
  • 1820s saw reduced power of elites = UK population grew 50% from 1810-1841, Great Reform Act increased suffrage to 16% of adult men.
  • 1845 Irish Famine allows Peel to repeal Corn Laws 1815, removes tariffs on West Indian sugar via Sugar Duties Act.
  • Navigation Acts repealed in 1849, global trade grew by 10 times from 1849-1909.
  • In 1851, UK produced 2/3 of global coal exports and half of global cotton cloth.
  • By 1913, UK coal industry reached its peak at 94 million tons exported annually, and 70% of global textiles.
• Trade with other nations

  • By 1850s, 7% of UK exports were to Latin America.
  • From 1800-1850, 40% of US imports were from Britain.
  • By 1914, 20% of UK trade was with the USA.
  • In 1900, UK provided India with iron and engineering products while India provided raw cotton, rice, tea, wheat and hides.