Trade and Industrialization in Hong Kong

Abstract

Located at the mouth of the Pearl River delta, Hong Kong is a convenient port for trade. Opium, tea, silver, and textile constituted the key goods that Western companies exchanged and smuggled into China through Hong Kong during the nineteenth century. As stipulated by the Treaty of Nanjing (1842), British traders and diplomats built a colonial city that became one of the cornerstones of the British Empire in Asia. The economy of Hong Kong specialized in long-distance trade and the city reached one million inhabitants in 1937.1 During the Japanese occupation of China, the city was a neutral point of contact between Chongqing’s Free China, the International Concessions of Shanghai, and the occupied cities of China. However, Hong Kong also fell under Japanese control on the Christmas day of 1941, and communication between Chongqing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong came to a standstill. The defeat of the British Empire in Asia and the end of the Treaty Port system did not change the status of Hong Kong, which was later returned to British hands after the Japanese surrendered. The city continued to be an important strategic point for long-distance trade, intelligence gathering, and liaison between regions.