The Social History of Agriculture by Christopher Isett

Author:Christopher Isett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: undefined
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2012-04-15T00:00:00+00:00

Taiwan

In 1894 Japan went to war against China and won decisively. Under the terms of the peace treaty that followed, it acquired the island of Taiwan. Japan’s victory, and the acquisition of its first colony, signalled to those at home and abroad the success of its efforts to modernize and join the exclusive club of imperial Great Powers.

Less than thirty years prior, in 1868, a clique of modernizing samurai toppled the Tokugawa shogunate, euthanized remnants of the feudal order, and embarked on the mission to lift Japan into the ranks of industrialized nations. They abolished the privileges of the samurai class, pensioned off the daimyo, removed the feudal domains and established modern prefectures, created a conscript army, built modern schools, and enacted a German-styled constitution with the Meiji emperor at its head. Following the creation of a national bank in 1882, commercial and industrial policies were drafted that deepened the gains of Japan’s rural capitalists and nursed the formation of modern industrialists.

While the news of military victory over China was well received in Japan, the domestic mood was far from buoyant. Facing shortfalls in public revenue at home and mounting diplomatic pressure abroad, many worried that the costs of Japan’s first colony outweighed foreseeable benefits. Some urged the government to sell the island and invest the money at home. Parsimonious politicians agreed. Pro-empire elements within the cabinet were, however, reluctant to surrender this highly symbolic prize. They were eager to leverage Japan’s newfound military prowess and rising industrial strength to abrogate thirty-year-old treaties that impinged on national sovereignty. After much debate, Taiwan was kept but colonial administrators were told that the island would have to pay for itself.

Conditions on the island were far from promising. Taiwan was without modern industry, its infrastructure was beyond antiquated, and local capital was concentrated in the hands of native merchants and landlords who showed no interest in modernizing agriculture or investing in new industry. As for the peasantry, they were bereft of capital despite the long hours of work they put in every day—circumstances vividly described by one observer:

Farming in Formosa is very hard work, and only by the strictest economy can it be made even fairly remunerative.

The entire farm of a family in Formosa would make but a garden for an agriculturalist in America. The owner of eight or ten acres is looked upon as in easy circumstances. The farms are all small and are entirely without fences. A rice-farm is divided into little irregular plots for the purposes of irrigation. These plots are made by throwing up around each low mounds of earth, by which means the water is retained at the required depth.

As two crops, and sometimes three, are reaped every year, the farmer is kept busy from spring to autumn. During seedtime and harvest his wife rises at three o’clock in the morning, cooks rice and salted vegetables, prepares hot water for the men to wash with, and about four calls them up to breakfast. The men are in the

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