Suchergebnisse

This study forms a welcome addition to the growing number of works on the economic history of Southeast Asia. In his Foreword, Dr John F. Cady, the author of A History of Modern Burma, writes that Dr Cheng ""has placed all students of Burma in her debt by this highly articulate and clarifying contribution to the country's economic history

From prehistoric times rice (oryza sativalinn) has been cultivated in Burma but it was only about a century ago that Burma began to develop into the chief rice-exporting country of the world. Up to about the middle of the nineteenth century rice was cultivated mainly for home consumption and for a small, irregular internal trade mainly from Lower to Upper Burma. The earliest account we have of Burma's external rice trade is probably the one by Duarte Barbosa who mentioned that much rice was shipped from Pegu to Malacca and Sumatra in the beginning of the sixteenth century. At that time Pegu was an independent kingdom peopled by Mons (known also as Talaings or Peguans). Their kings appeared to have viewed trade in a more favourable light than did the Burmans for during their time trade was much less hampered than after Pegu became subject to the Burmans.