Peasants, Farmers, and Agricultural History - Class IX

In the context of British colonial administration in India, the term Ryots refers to the peasants or cultivators who worked the land.

Peasants were reluctant to cultivate opium because the government-fixed prices were low, the crop was difficult to grow, and it required intensive labor, making it an unattractive option for poor farmers.

"Captain Swing" was the name appended to several threatening letters during the rural English Swing Riots of 1830, when labourers rioted over the introduction of new threshing machines and the loss of their livelihoods. Captain Swing was described as a hard-working tenant farmer driven to destitution and despair by social and political change in the early nineteenth century.

During the colonial period, Indian farmers produced crops like Indigo, opium to cater to the world market. These were the two major commercial crops on the 19th century.

The Indian farmers were not willing to divert their best fields for opium cultivation because it would have resulted in poor production cereals and pulses. Many cultivators did not own land. For opium cultivation, they had to lease land from landlords and pay rent. The cultivation of opium was a difficult process and time consuming. This would have left little time for the farmers to care for other crops. The government paid very low price for the opium which made it an unprofitable proposition.

During the 19th and early 20th centuries, the expansion of wheat cultivation in the American Midwest led to the United States being referred to as the bread basket of the world.

• When enclosures came up, the enclosed land became the exclusive property of one landowner.
• The poor could no longer collect their firewood from the forests, or graze their cattle on the commons.
• They could no longer collect apples and berries, or hunt small animals for meat.
• Everything had a price which the poor could not afford to pay. The poor were displaced from the land leading to  migration in search of work.

Growing turnip crops makes the land fertile. Turnip was a good fodder crop for cattle. These crop have the capacity to increase the nitrogen content of the soil.

The British East India Company assumes control of Bengal and Bihar, opium-growing districts of India. British companies extracted huge profits by smuggling opium trade out of Calcutta to China. Offically opium is still banned in China.

Early in the 18th century the Portuguese found that they could import opium from India and sell it in China at a considerable profit. By 1773 the British had discovered the trade, and that year they became the leading suppliers of the Chinese market. The British East India Company established a monopoly on opium cultivation in the Indian province of Bengal, where they developed a method of growing opium poppies cheaply and abundantly. Other Western countries also joined in the trade, including the United States, which dealt in Turkish as well as Indian opium.

 During the First World War the world market boomed. Russian supplies of wheat were cut off and the USA had to feed Europe. US President Wilson called upon farmers to respond to the need of the time. 

In the colonial period, rural India also came to produce a range of crops for the world market. In the early nineteenth century, indigo and opium were two of the major commercial crops. By the end of the century, peasants were producing sugarcane, cotton, jute, wheat and several other.

The British East India Company established a monopoly on opium cultivation in the Indian province of Bengal, where they developed a method of growing opium poppies cheaply and abundantly.

• Unwilling
  cultivators were made to produce opium through a system of advances. These
  loans tied the peasant to the headmen and through him to the government.
• By giving advances the cultivator, was forced
  to grow opium on a specified area of land. The farmers were bound to hand over
  his produce to the government agents and accept the low price offered.

• He had no option of planting the field with a
  crop of his choice or selling his product to anyone but the government agent.

• The cultivator also had no choice but to
  accept the low price offered for the practice.

While the English cultivated a taste for Chinese tea, the Chinese became addicted to opium.

Before 1767, no more than 500 chests (of two maunds each) were being exported from India. Within four years, the quantity trebled. A hundred years later, in 1870, the government was exporting about 50,000 chests annually. 

Great Britain, exported opium grown in India and sold it to China. The British used the profits from the sale of opium to purchase such Chinese luxury goods as porcelain, silk, and tea, which were in great demand in the West.

Impacts on England;
1- It led to the industrial revolution.
2- The industrial revolution further led to colonialism.
3- It led to the use of science and technology in agriculture.
4- It led to the increase in production.
5- It reduced England's dependence on Europe for food grains.

. It has many local names such as lading in Southeast Asia, milpa in Central America, chitemene or tavy  in Africa, and chena in Sri Lanka.  In India, dhya, penda, bewar, nevad, jhum, podu, khandad and  kumri are some of the local terms for swidden agriculture. Rabi is a kind of crop.

By 1773, the British East India Company had established a strong monopoly over the trade of opium in Bengal, which they exported to China.

Common land provided essential resources like fuel, grazing for livestock, and foraging, which acted as a safety net for the poor in rural England.

Threshing machines replaced manual threshing labor, throwing agricultural workers out of jobs. The Swing riots (1830s, not 1930s) were protests by impoverished farm workers destroying these machines that threatened their livelihoods. Captain Swing was a symbolic name, not a real person.

During the Captain Swing movement (1830-1832), farm workers across southern English counties (Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, etc.) systematically destroyed threshing machines. This was a widespread protest against unemployment and low wages caused by mechanization.

The Agricultural Revolution began in Great Britain around the turn of the 18th century. In many ways, British agriculture advanced more rapidly than any other European nation. The increased agricultural production of the 18th century can be traced to four interrelated factors:

• The increased availability of farmland.
• A favorable climate.
• More livestock.
• Improved crop yield.

During the Napoleonic Wars, prices of foodgrains were high and farmers expanded production vigorously. Fearing a shortage of labour, they began buying the new threshing machines that had come into the market. They complained of the insolence of labourers, their drinking habits, and the difficulty of making them work. The machines, they thought, would help them reduce their dependence on labourers. 

 In 1831, Cyrus McCormick invented the first mechanical reaper which could cut in one day as much as five men could cut with cradles and 16 men with sickles. 

 In 1785, about 15 million pounds of tea was being imported into England. By 1830, the figure had jumped to over 30 million pounds. In fact, the profits of the East India Company came to depend on the tea trade. England at this time produced nothing that could be easily sold in China. They could buy tea only by paying in silver coins or bullion. It was believed that a loss of treasure would impoverish the nation and deplete its wealth.  They searched for a commodity they could sell in China, something they could persuade the Chinese to buy. Opium was such a commodity. By the early 1820s, about 10,000 crates were being annually smuggled into China. 

In many parts of England, the farmers began to grow turnip as-

• Turnip improved the soil and made it fertile.
• Turnip was a good fodder crop and relished by the cattle.
• This crop had the capacity to increase nitrogen content of the soil.

Riots spread over southern England and about 387 threshing machines were broken. Through this period, farmers received threatening letters urging them to stop using machines that deprived workmen of their livelihood. 

The Enclosure Movement was most essential for planning crop rotation to improve the soil.

Western merchants in the mid-eighteenth century began an illegal trade in opium. It was unloaded in a number of sea ports of south-eastern China and carried by local agents to the interiors. By the early 1820s, about 10,000 crates were being annually smuggled into China. While the English cultivated a taste for Chinese tea, the Chinese became addicted to opium. 

Historical records indicate that the major wave of white American migration into the Mississippi Valley occurred between 1820 and 1850 as part of westward expansion.

• The British East India Company established a monopoly on opium cultivation in the Indian province of Bengal, where they developed a method of growing opium poppies cheaply and abundantly so that they could sell it in china. It took place in 1773.
  
• In the year 1870 British government exported 50,000 chests of opium from Bengal annually.
  
• In 1820s opium production decreased rapidly in British occupied territories. Production increased in princely states and Rajasthan which are unoccupied territories because here, the local traders were offering much higher prices to peasants which made the peasants interested to grow opium.
  
• In 1780s village headmen started paying peasants for producing opium in advance so as to attract poor farmers to grow opium.
  

The European peasants had discovered that planting crops like clover and turnip improved the soil and made it more fertile. Turnip was a good fodder crop for cattle. These crops had the capacity to increase the nitrogen content of the soil. Nitrogen was important for crop growth. Cultivation of the same soil over a few years depleted the nitrogen in the soil and reduced its fertility. By restoring nitrogen, turnip and clover made the soil fertile once again