Mitsui Bussan and the Manchurian soybean trade: Geopolitics and economic strategies in China’s Northeast, ca. 1870s–1920s

Abstract

This article examines how soybeans became a global commodity, by focusing on the intermediary role of the Japanese trading company Mitsui Bussan. In the early twentieth century, soybeans were almost exclusively grown in Northeast China, also known as Manchuria. Their global commodification was a result of complex imperial rivalries among China, Japan, and Russia in northeast China as well as the rapid rise of vegetable oil consumption in Europe. We demonstrate how Mitsui Bussan navigated the shifting geopolitical terrain by taking advantage of the competition between the Russian and Japanese empires, utilizing Chinese middlemen effectively, and securing support from the Japanese government and military. By placing the soybean trade in a geopolitical context, we shed light on how global commodity markets, trade, and international relations were intertwined.

KEYWORDS:

• Soybean
• Manchuria
• Mitsui
• history
• global commodities
• Japan
• Russia
• China
• Europe
• globalization
• nineteenth century
• twentieth century
• trading companies

Acknowledgments

We greatly benefited from comments and criticism we received from Espen Storli, Marten Boon and the participants of two workshops regarding the topic of this special issue (Rotterdam, 2017, and Trondheim, 2018). In addition, we are grateful for suggestions we received in the fall 2018 from members of the research group “Transnational History and Cultural Encounters, 1850-present” at the University of Bergen. Special thanks goes to Mary Lane for her editorial help.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Manchuria commonly refers to the three northeastern provinces of China, Heilongjiang, Jilin (Kirin), and Liaoning (Fengtian), as well as parts of Inner Mongolia. With the rise of the Manchu Qing dynasty in the seventeenth century, this region formed a unified whole, which in political, cultural and economic terms can be sensibly identified as one territory. In contemporary China, the term ‘Manchuria’ ceased to be used because of its connection to Japaense imperialism; the region is rather referred to as the ‘Eastern Three Provinces’ (Dongsansheng), ‘Northeast China’, or simply ‘The Northeast’ (Dongbei). In this article, we follow the common practice among historians to use Manchuria and Northeast China interchangeably (Elliott, 2000; Tamanoi, 2009).

2. The trading company was known in English as ‘Mitsui & Co’. In order to differentiate the Mitsui zaibatsu, we use ‘Mitsui Bussan’ for the trading company and ‘Mitsui’ for the zaibatsu (for details see part 3 of this article).

3. Yingkou was opened to foreign trade by the Treaty of Tientsin of 1858. The British moved the treaty port of Newchwang to nearby Yingkou; therefore, confusingly, both Yinkou and Newchwang were used interchangeably at the time (Nield, 2015, p. 166). In this article, we use Yingkou.

4. The city of Dalian had been renamed several times. The Russians called it Dalny and the Japanese renamed it to Dairen during the time they controlled it (1905–1945).

5. For this December shipment, Mitsui used both Dairen (129,000 tons) and Vladivostok (131,000 tons).

6. Jardines was the first to open a modern soybean mill in Yingkou. Nield, 2015, p. 168.

7. As soybeans were harvested in the fall, the trading season ran from on November 1 of the year mentioned to October 31 of the following year.

8. In 1922, Vladovostok exported 375,993 tons of beans and 18,850 tons of oil (total 394,843), while Dairen exported 494,640 tons of beans and 131,010 tons of oil (total of 625,650). By 1925, Vladivostok was exporting 641,965 tons of beans and 38,540 tons of oil (680,505); Dairen’s figures from that year were 809,285 of beans and 108,300 of oil (917,585). See Dairen Urajio ryōkō no shōchō (1926, p. 99).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Hiromi Mizuno

Hiromi Mizuno is Associate Professor of History at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Her current research involves chemical fertilizer and environmental history in Asia.

Ines Prodöhl

Ines Prodöhl is Associate Professor of Economic History at the University of Bergen. She focusses on agriculture and industry in the nineteenth and twentieth century, including the history of soybeans.