The Structural Transformation of Yangtze River Shipping in the Late Nineteenth Century : A Quantitative Analysis of Maritime Customs Data, 1873-1882

This study aims to empirically examine the structural transformation of Yangtze River shipping from 1873 to 1882 through a quantitative analysis of the Imperial Maritime Customs shipping data from the major treaty ports of Hankou and Jiujiang. To properly utilize the Maritime Customs shipping data, it is necessary to first understand the characteristics and limitations of the data. This study pays particular attention to the distinction between employed tonnage and tonnage with cargo. A comparison of cargo loading rates between Hankou and Jiujiang reveals that Hankou maintained an average of 96%, demonstrating its characteristics as a terminal port, while Jiujiang recorded only about 60%, resulting in a double-counting effect as an intermediate port. Based on this analysis, this study focuses on Hankou's data to examine the dominance of steam shipping and the transformation of competition by flag state. Steamers consistently accounted for over 90% of total foreign vessel tonnage with cargo throughout the period, maintaining overwhelming dominance, and competition in tea transport between river steamers and ocean steamers ultimately resulted in the predominance of river steamers. By flag state, the American flag, which held 67% in 1873, declined sharply following the 1877 acquisition of the Shanghai Steam Navigation Company fleet and completely withdrew by 1879, after which the British and Chinese flags divided the market in a duopoly structure. The "friendly arrangement" of 1878 and the three-company pool agreement of 1882 institutionalized this structure. This study seeks to complement previous research, which has focused on enterprise history or political-economic contexts, with quantitative analysis of Maritime Customs data, while establishing a methodological foundation for data interpretation.