Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- Maps
- Abbreviations
- Notes on dates, contemporaneous spellings, currency, and weights
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The international economy and the East India trade
- 2 A formal theoretical model of the East India Company's trade
- 3 The structure of early trade and the pattern of commercial settlements in Asia
- 4 The evolution of the Company's trading system: operation and policy 1660–1760
- 5 Long-term trends and fluctuations 1660–1760
- 6 Politics of trade
- 7 Markets, merchants, and the Company
- 8 The export of treasure and the monetary system
- 9 The structure of country trade in Asia
- 10 Export of European commodities
- 11 The Company and the Indian textile industry
- 12 The Company's trade in textiles
- 13 Pepper
- 14 Import of bulk goods
- 15 Raw silk
- 16 Coffee
- 17 Imports from China
- 18 Financial results
- 19 Conclusion
- APPENDICES
- General glossary
- Bibliography
- Short titles cited in the reference notes
- Notes
- Index
11 - The Company and the Indian textile industry
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 July 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Figures
- Maps
- Abbreviations
- Notes on dates, contemporaneous spellings, currency, and weights
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 The international economy and the East India trade
- 2 A formal theoretical model of the East India Company's trade
- 3 The structure of early trade and the pattern of commercial settlements in Asia
- 4 The evolution of the Company's trading system: operation and policy 1660–1760
- 5 Long-term trends and fluctuations 1660–1760
- 6 Politics of trade
- 7 Markets, merchants, and the Company
- 8 The export of treasure and the monetary system
- 9 The structure of country trade in Asia
- 10 Export of European commodities
- 11 The Company and the Indian textile industry
- 12 The Company's trade in textiles
- 13 Pepper
- 14 Import of bulk goods
- 15 Raw silk
- 16 Coffee
- 17 Imports from China
- 18 Financial results
- 19 Conclusion
- APPENDICES
- General glossary
- Bibliography
- Short titles cited in the reference notes
- Notes
- Index
Summary
Advantage in comparative costs
Before the discovery of machine spinning and weaving in Britain in the second half of the eighteenth century, the Indian subcontinent was probably the world's greatest producer of cotton textiles. The overseas markets in Asia and Africa were of course long dominated by Indian products, and to the demands of these two continents Europe added its own in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. While hand weaving of cotton goods was indigenous to most countries which had access to local supplies of raw materials, the finer and luxury fabrics were a special feature of the Indian production. Even as late as 1772 Henry Pattullo in the course of his comments on the economic resources of Bengal could claim confidently that the demand for its textile manufactures could never lessen because no other nation on the globe could either equal or rival their quality. This observation does not prove conclusively that the contemporary writers attributed India's supremacy in textile industry to the mastery over problems of technology, but it reveals at least a widespread awareness of the unique position of the Indian products and the role played by manufacturing quality in the world demand for these textile goods. While Pattullo put his emphasis on technological skills, an earlier writer had stressed lower production costs in India. That international trade was, among other things, a function of price differentials was a view put forward in most succinct terms by the author of an anonymous tract printed in 1701.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Trading World of Asia and the English East India Company1660-1760, pp. 237 - 276Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1978