Xinshun 1730

Chapter 870 "Unfair" Competition ([-])
The reason for doing it this season.

The fundamental reason is that the negotiations in the Netherlands have taken shape, and the event has come to an end.

The reason for making use of the topic is to investigate and deal with it in this season and directly seize a large amount of goods-the monsoon will start in January, so this time period is the time when the payment has been paid and the goods are still being loaded but have not yet left.

It may not be all confiscated after being seized, it only needs to be seized for a month or two, and the monsoon is missed.

This is also a method learned from the Dutch. In Batavia and Malacca, they often deal with competitors in this way.

Detained in the name of suspected pirates for two or three months to miss the monsoon, thus helping VOC's monopoly.

And as long as it is seized, such a large amount of cash flow will be cut off. It is estimated that the Portuguese merchants and the shareholders of the British East India Company will cry without tears.

From a purely "free trade" point of view, purely academic debate, this is of course unfair competition.But all countries have not engaged in free trade, and Dashun's slogan is loud and loud, but it is not the case in practice.

Moreover, the reasons for finding fault are also very legitimate: human trafficking and opium.

Human trafficking is something that is well known from top to bottom.Even if you didn't know it before, you should know it after going to Nanyang.The court pretends to be an ostrich.

Macau itself has been in serious decline in recent years because the trade center moved northward to the Yangtze River Estuary, so it can take advantage of the opportunity of Dashun to expel the Catholics to engage in population trade in order to earn some money.

The emperor reprimanded the Jiedu envoy of Guangdong, saying that the criminal department of the previous court had mentioned this matter in the matter, so naturally they shot first and then drew the target, and specially asked someone to dig it out from the pile of old papers.

In the 42 years of Wanli in the previous dynasty, policies were indeed introduced because of the issue of Chinese slave trade.

The introduction of this policy proves that human trafficking is already serious.

Dashun has also introduced policies, but it is difficult to say whether the policies introduced by them, whether it is to care about it, how much effort is spent on it, or because they pretend to love the people, seem to be passable.

No matter what, population trading is wrong.Before, we turned a blind eye, but turning a blind eye and not breaking the law are not the same thing.

Close your eyes and ignore it, that is, ignore it, right?

Open your eyes, there is a reason, justified.

And the opium issue... this, the Portuguese are really hard to clean up.

After the British East India Company issued the ban on opium here, theoretically it was not carried on board its own company's ship, but subcontracted to second-hand traffickers-I only produce and wholesale, but I do not retail, so I am not guilty of the logic .

The main reason is that the British East India Company weighed the size of this side and found that it can't beat it now.

In the past, Catholics were full of courts, and the British had finally obtained direct trade opportunities, so they didn't dare to cause trouble for themselves in this kind of matter, and could only play around the edges.

The company is also an entity. Once the company is embargoed, the company's tea, raw silk and other businesses will be completely exhausted.

The Portuguese are different.

It has taken root in Macau since the previous dynasty. Although there have been crises, they have passed.

I feel that the roots of the tree are big and deep, and I feel that everything is stable, and I don’t worry about anything at all.

With a wide network of contacts, and there is no legal person of a large company, the arrest is only a private act.

Even the Portuguese government issued a policy because of the British East India Company’s transshipment of them: it is not allowed to buy opium from foreigners in Macau, and we have to collect, transport, and sell through one-stop.

Of course, it is almost worse than the one-stop planting, harvesting, transporting and selling of the British later.

At this time, the Portuguese not only monopolized, but also created a "brand".

Those grown in Goa are called Malwa; those grown in Turkey are called Golden Flowers; those grown in Bangladesh are called Patana.

Historically, before the British established the "opium plantation cooperative" in India in 1773 to provide small loans and unified purchase and sales, the opium imported from the West was mainly Turkish golden flowers, which were generally collected, transported and sold by the Portuguese; the Dutch A part of Malwa is transported and sold mainly to Fujian and Nanyang.

From 1773 to 1818, in order to make money, the United Kingdom announced that only Patana produced by itself could be sold, but Malva could not be sold.At this time, the golden flowers produced in Turkey will not work.Patana is mainly produced in Bangladesh controlled by the United Kingdom.

From 1819 to 1830, Jewish merchants, local gentry, officials, and smugglers cooperated to build a secret warehouse on Lingding Island.Although the British East India Company wanted to monopolize the market, Malva brought by a large number of retail merchants and smugglers gradually robbed Patana of the market.The process is somewhat similar to the war between smuggled tea and "legal" tea in North America, with the smuggled tea winning.

In 1830, the East India Company understood a truth: blocking is worse than sparse.So instead of chasing and intercepting him, he changed to collect taxes on Malwa. As long as the taxes are paid, it is legal.Anyway, it's the company that makes money, so it doesn't matter if it's Malwa or Patana.

This era is not what it was a hundred years ago.

Against the backdrop of the decline of Portugal's national strength, the establishment of the East India Company by countries such as Sweden and Denmark, and the fact that Prussia even sent the Apollo to trade, Macau's special status has disappeared.

The decline of the transit port accelerated the smuggling of opium.

Because they want to make money, but the disappearance of the status of the only transit port leads to no money to make, so they can only do crooked ways.

Human trafficking and opium smuggling are now the two pillar industries in Macau.

The recovery of Macau caused by the war in the past few years has not stopped these two industries.On the contrary, because the United Kingdom was afraid of the French robbing the ship, it was more active in Macau and borrowed the Portuguese ship, so that a large amount of British opium also tried to seize the market, but there were more.

However, in terms of absolute numbers, it is not that serious, and the impact is not that great.

Although the imperial court had issued a ban long ago, they didn't care too much about it. They just let the customs take care of it. They didn't care too much about the big hole in Macau.

The main thing is that there is no way to control it.

Macau has been special for more than 200 years, and the locals are familiar with the places, so they are already regarded as local snakes.Many local people participated in it. Once the local people participated, the court would be blinded.

In short, despite this and that, the overall opium import volume is not to the point where the imperial court has to take special care of it, and it is still a surge before the embankment breaks.

This time, he had to find fault in Macau. From a subjective point of view, the emperor had no sense of guarding against the passing of time.

Subjectively, it is purely for the future profits of the Western Trading Company, and to attack Portugal and the British East India Company through non-war means to cut off their capital flow and cause trouble.Subjectively, it is not for the issue of human trade and opium.

Objectively speaking, through this kind of campaign, the above directly sent people from the Boyer Army to investigate and find faults with opium, and it did have the effect of completely eradicating it and preventing it from happening.

As for selling opium to Europe in reverse, Liu Yu never thought about it.

First of all, this thing is not something made by humans.

Second, it's not necessary.

The French have a headache all day long, how to scrape together enough silver to buy goods in China; the Swedes have a headache because China has nothing to exchange for Chinese goods except the Spanish silver dollars from Cadiz.

Lao Ma also wrote such a thing in his article "History of the Opium Trade":

[Montgomery Martin once asked Shanghai Daotai what is the best way to promote our trade with China.In the presence of Her Majesty's consul, Captain Balfour, Shanghai Daotai immediately replied to me: Don't send us so much opium, so we can (have currency) buy your products. 】

The Martin here seems to be Robert Montgomery Martin, probably the first pseudo-financial secretary in Hong Kong.

The old horse's conclusions and predictions are indeed terrifyingly accurate.

【The finances of the British government in India actually depend not only on the opium trade with China, but also on the illegality of this trade. 】

[If the Chinese government legalizes the opium trade and at the same time permits the cultivation of cherry poppy in China, the treasury of the British and Indian governments will be severely damaged. 】

[The British government publicly promotes the free trade of opium, but secretly maintains its own monopoly on opium production. 】

[Any time we look closely at the heroic, free trade nature, we will find that its "free trade" is, after all, a monopoly. 】

In other words, Lao Ma felt that the reason why Britain was able to obtain excess profits was that the Qing government still opposed the opium trade, which it considered illegal.

Or to put it more broadly, I can produce, but if you don't produce, I will call for free trade.Anyone who yells like this, no matter how nicely they yell and how free they are, is essentially a monopoly.

As for opioids, once free trade is really implemented and cultivation is liberalized, not only will you not be able to make any money, but you may even become the largest producer of opioids.

That's why Britain publicly promotes free trade while secretly maintaining a monopoly.

This argument and prophecy is very accurate.

Scary even.

Because it won't be long before it will become the world's largest opium producer, at least it can no longer earn a dime from opium smuggling.

That's why Tang Tiezui stopped smoking opium, and changed to Hadman in the British Empire and white noodles in Japan.Instead of the hibiscus ointment of the British Empire.

Due to technical reasons, foreign products of hibiscus paste are not competitive; due to technical reasons, white noodles cannot be produced in China.

Yes.

On the one hand, the essence of Dashun's development of European trade is not for silver and trade surplus, because these things can be delivered by others while sitting at home.

The purpose of Liu Yufei's European trade is to pull up and expand the emerging classes through the external market, not to earn those few silvers.

If you really want to earn silver to enrich the national treasury, wouldn't it be good to do business in Malacca?Didn't that actually improve the stability of this reactionary fortress?
But just waiting for people to come to pick up the goods, the machine textile industry will never be developed in a lifetime: if it is developed, will people not increase tariffs and ban cotton cloth?The trade initiative is in the hands of others, if you say no, you don't want it.

On the other hand, the only way you can make money by selling opioids to others is that they do not grow them themselves, which is illegal.

It really makes people anxious, the silver is outflowing rapidly, can they not grow it themselves?

What is the technical difficulty of this shit?
It is more technically difficult for the old man in the square to play spinning top than to cut this thing.

The government implements a method similar to the monopoly of salt and iron, and legalizes it, not to make money, but to raise the navy to fight back.

At that time, there will be a lot of mess, and a large area of ​​these things will not be sold, so they will all find ways to sell them in China?

This thing can only be profitable if it is illegal.

But Dashun must be illegal, so it must be huge profits.

At that time, the trouble will be infected with himself, and he will definitely feel uncomfortable all over.

Foreign thieves are easy to guard against, but how can domestic thieves be guarded against?At that time, what should we do if we raise a group of interest groups who make a fortune with this thing, coerce public opinion, and demand legalization?Even the next emperor himself thinks, what if this thing is really profitable with the franchise of salt and iron?

Therefore, whether it is for personal reasons, or the conclusions deduced by that set of economic theories, or for the consideration of boosting the domestic manufacturing industry.

Liu Yu didn't want to engage in any opium wars or hibiscus ointment wars at all.

Meaningless, but will seriously restrict the sales of normal goods.The money is spent smoking opium, and I have no money to buy Songjiang cotton cloth.

He didn't want to go to war with Portugal now, the emperor didn't realize the seriousness of the problem subjectively, and the imperial court didn't want to deal with a large number of expelled Catholics in Macau now-there were places where they were exiled, but the imperial court even emigrated from the Huanghuai River. I can't even afford the money, so how can I spend it on these people who would rather die than quit the religion?

Therefore, this investigation of Macau is a standard and Dashun-style "some things are not on the scale, but they are not worth a thousand catties".

And this kind of thing of four or two thousand catties has always been handled very strictly.

Because, to do it, in itself, means that the emperor wants this matter to be a great deal.

And the attitude of the emperor determines the degree of attack by the people below.

In order to avoid the interference of the local local snakes, the Jiedu envoy is directly responsible for the supervision, and the Haier army, the navy, and the local garrison jointly investigate and deal with each other to restrict and monitor each other.

(End of this chapter)