The Impact Of The Great Depression On China’s Silk-reeling Industry

The Great Depression of1929-1933led to a worldwide economic recession. This paper focuses on the impact of the Great Depression on China’s silk-reeling industry. Based on the past studies, this paper first describes a profile of Chinese silk-reeling industry before the crisis in the following aspects:the rise of filatures, the equipment numbers, and international trade. After that, this article discusses the effect of the Great Depression on the Chinese silk-reeling industry from main lines of trade and financial factors. After studying the export of Chinese raw silk, changes of the international market demand for Chinese raw silk, dependence on the demand of the U.S. market, the paper view that the sharp drop of the international demand for Chinese raw silk produced profound impact in the context of the Great Depression. Then, the study investigates the impact from the financial factors through economic theory. Why the decline of the silver price did not stimulate exports of Chinese raw silk? What did the U.S. Sliver Purchase Act bring to Chinese silk-reeling industry? Finally, from the history logic of evolution of the Chinese silk-reeling industry, this paper concludes that it is the sharply decline in international demand for Chinese raw silk and exchange rate conditions produces profound impact on the Chinese silk-reeling industry.