In this paper the following subject will be outlined: ‘What are the effects that the opium war brought about to China’s social and economic Evolution?’.
We will start with describing China’s social and economic structure and the events that have led to the first Opium War in China followed by the second Opium War. After this we will take a look at the social and economic disruption these events have brought onto the Country.
Paper Information
Course 1: The business Environment in China
Module: Be1
Code: Be12
Lecture title: The evolution of China’s economic policy
Lecturer: Fan Zhang Starting of the First Opium War
Under the system created by the Qing dynasty to help regulate trade in the 18th century, traders from Western …show more content…
The government prohibited the use of opium. The Chinese government also noticed that the silver they had acquired was leaving the country, this was not good for the Chinese economy. Because of these reason the government heavenly enforced the rules.
For a long time, the rules could still be bend, because of corruption. This changed during 1839 when inspector Lin Zexu forced the British traders to hand over their opium goods, so they could be destroyed. In September of the year 1839 the hole year supply of opium was destroyed. The total cost was 3.000.000 million pounds, that translates to about 300.00.000 million when translated to current value.
The British government could not accept these new rules and saw the destruction of its opium as a declaration of war from the Chinese Government. This started the first Opium War. The British government had send its modern ships from Brits-Indie to China. Even though the British fleet was smaller it still defeated the Chinese warships because it was more advanced.
After the first Opium war the two parties signed an agreement called ‘Nanking agreement’. Even though it is called an agreement, the details where enforced by the British government and China had no option but to …show more content…
These effects from the events can still be seen today and can even be felt between business negotiations between England and China.
The treaties signed in Nanking and Tientsin have opened numerous shipping ports in China. This has had the effect that there was a big influx of foreign trade in the country. Because of the opening of these trading posts it increased the export of products like tea over 500% and silk export increased to 28 times the previous amount of bales being shipped. Also with the new singed treaties foreigners where now able to move freely in the country, with no restrictions and very low exporting tax. The low taxing that was imposed on the Chinese market was devastating for the inland production.
The increase in trade has meant for China that it was rapidly losing a lot of Spanish silver dollar. There was even a shortage in the currency. The Chinese copper currency depreciated in value due to bad administration and a shortage of the copper material. As a result of these events China’s financial system was nearly devastated and in 1853 paper money was introduced in the