"Mountains as the Lifeline"

From the mid-Ming to the early Qing, cash crops that were widespread in upland Southeast China, including indigo, ramie (a fiber plant), and tobacco, were often associated by the state with shack people and social unrest, and treated as a threat to food supply. Meanwhile, however, many local officials held different views. Not only were these crops a target for taxation in many places, but they were, after the early Qing, also seen as with great economic potential in cultivating the uplands, where limited water and fertile land made it difficult to grow wet rice widely. In addition, in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries when maize cultivation made an allegedly destructive impact on the soil, officials ordered and made efforts to replace maize with these crops which were seen as causing less damage. Finally, towards the end of the Qing, local officials worked to provide financial and technological support for local residents to cultivate the upland area. In all, the shifting agricultural policies concerning cash crops in Southeast China refresh our understanding of agricultural and economic policy in late imperial China in general, which has been understood as focusing more on lowland production of rice, silk, and cotton

Agriculture · Ancient history · Archaeology · China · Geography · Chinese history and philosophy · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies