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By Go Bon Juan
Editor’s note: The Sixth Dr. Jose P. Rizal
Awards for Excellence awarding ceremony will be held at 7 p.m., June
14, 2008, at the Kaisa-Angelo King Heritage Center on Anda and
Cabildo streets, Intramuros, Manila.
Ideally, relations between two countries should
be mutual, with benefits going both ways. But in a partnership
between a big nation and a small one—or between a great power and
an ordinary one—the bigger or more powerful partner normally
enjoys an edge.
Take, for example, the relations between China
and the Philippines. We always hear of the contributions to and
influence of the Chinese on the Philippines, but seldom the other
way around. But the fact is, the Philippines and the Filipino people
have significantly influenced and contributed to China.
History books cite the important role of the
galleon trade between Manila and Acapulco in the Philippine economy.
But since most of the goods traded between Manila and Acapulco
actually came from China, attention is usually given to the
contribution of the Chinese and the Chinese goods to Philippine
economy and not so much on the contributions to and influences of
the galleon trade on China’s economy.
Professor Andrew Wilson’s Ambition and
Identity: Chinese Merchant Elites in Colonial Manila, 1880-1916
(University of Hawaii Press, 2005) gives this interesting
description of how the galleon trade contributed to and influenced
China’s economy at the time: “Manila was the major entrepot for
Sino-Spanish trade for the two centuries after its founding in 1571.
Of all the Chinese products brought to Manila, silks and porcelains
were the most sought after. To pay for Chinese manufactures, the
Spanish exported huge amounts of silver from their Mexican and
Peruvian mines. In 1597, for example, it was estimated that 345,000
kilograms of silver entered China via Manila. This exceeded the
total amount of silver produced by China’s domestic mines in the
preceding 50 years. Even in the 20th century, the Mexican silver
dollar was still the dominant, albeit unofficial, means of exchange
on the Chinese coast …
“For China, the material consequences of the
Manila trade were spectacular. The discovery and exploitation of
overseas markets for Chinese products catalyzed commercial expansion
along the southeast coast. Demand created a boom in the trade
networks of coastal China as suppliers scrambled to provide
Fujianese and Cantonese merchants with exports. Demand raised prices
and created fortunes for the ambitious, talented and lucky, leading
to a significant change in Chinese culture and society in the late
Ming era. The great prosperity traveled through China’s river
systems and marketing networks, resulting in a general increase in
wealth. The importance of household putting-out industries,
especially in tea harvesting and sericulture, commercialized the
rural economy and raised the value of domestic labor, particularly
the value of female labor. These developments had wide-ranging
consequences for Chinese society and the economy.”
It is clear from these passages that the
contributions and influences of the galleon trade on China, both
economically and financially, were so great that the course of
China’s historical development might have changed dramatically
without it.
So, although the Philippines may be small as a
nation, it did make great contributions and influences on a bigger
nation. Filipinos should be proud of this historic fact.
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