On The FuJian Grain Market In Qing Dynasty (1646-1840)

Grain plays a vital part in national economy and people's livelihood. Since the middle of Ming Dynasty, FuJian had been troubled by grain shortage, and the problem became more and more serious in the following Qing Dynasty. This paper focuses on the FuJian grain market and analyses the manifestation, harm and causes of grain shortage in the province and also grain market, grain price over a period of 200 years(1646—1840).It helps readers understand the grain issue of FuJian in Qing Dynasty and its influence to people's livelihood and the society. Based on the existing local historical documents, official archives and some predecessors' achievements, this paper elaborates on the issue by means of analysis, diagram and comparison etc. It includes four parts.First, overview of FuJian grain and emergence of problems. In this part, the author elaborates overview of grain supply and demand of in self—sufficient area, shortage area and surplus area, and points out the social contradictions and problems caused by grain shortage. The second part, the causes of grain shortage in FuJian in Qing Dynasty. The factors are various, increase in population, shrinkage of arable land per person, damage of water conservancy project, mass planting of industrial crops, prosperity of commodity economy and development of industrial and commercial coastal cities, difference of rice ripeness period, low per unit area yield and natural disasters all led to grain shortage. The third part, grain market in FuJian in Qing Dynasty. Grain shortage promoted the establishment of grain trafficking and selling markets, including inland grain transportation and sale market, Taiwan, and South—east Asian area market, (mainly Siam, old name of Thailand )Through these markets, rice was imported to FuJian province. The last part, grain price in FuJian in Qing Dynasty. The grain price had been showing a tendency of "high—low—high—low—high", along with seasonal and regional price difference from ShunZhi till TaoGuang years. What caused sustainable rise in FuJian grain price are respectively natural factors and social factors, in which the latter produced immense and lasting influence to grain price, To stabilize grain price, the Qing government adopted various policies and took some effective measures. They're mainly establishment of grain price reporting system, mass planting of coarse grains, improvement of grain storage regulations, encouragement of individual transportation. Through overall analysis of FuJian grain market in Qing Dynasty, the author aims to provide some revelations on how to deal with grain problems FuJian is confronted with nowadays.