|
This article is about the economic history of Colombia and its evolution from precolonial to modern times. ==Precolonial and colonial history== Indigenous peoples in Colombia predominantly cultivated maize and managed the Colombian climate and geography to develop planting technique using terraces. The indigenous also cultivated grass to use as roofs for their houses, and fique fiber to saw their clothing and artifacts. They also cultivated coca and marijuana for ceremonial purposes and local fruits and vegetables like yuca and potato for their diet. The indigenous peoples also were avid hunters and consumed processed local fauna.〔( En Colombia: Historia de los Humedales en Bogota; La Dieta Muisca y los Humedales ) encolombia.com Accessed 19 September 2007.〕 Colombia's economy during the colonial era was extractive and exploitative, relying heavily on cheap native labor. Domestic industry was constrained during the colonial period because the ''audiencia'' was bound to Spain as part of a mercantile system. Under this arrangement, the colony functioned as the source of primary materials and the consumer of manufactured goods, a trade pattern that tended to enrich the metropolitan power at the expense of the colony.〔Sturges-Vera.〕 Because Spaniards came to the New World in search of quick riches in the form of precious metals and jewels, mining for these items became the pillar of the economy for much of the colonial period. Indeed, the extraction of precious metals—such as gold and copper—in the American colonies formed the basis of the crown's economy.〔 Spain monopolized trade with the colonies. The crown limited authorization for intercontinental trade to Veracruz (in present-day Mexico), Nombre de Dios (in present-day Panama), and Cartagena. Direct trade with other colonies was prohibited; as a result, items from one colony had to be sent to Spain for reshipment to another colony. The crown also established the routes of transport and the number of ships allowed to trade in the colonies. Merchants involved in intercontinental trade had to be Spanish nationals. Finally, the crown circumscribed the type of merchandise that could be traded. The colony could export to Spain only precious metals, gold in particular, and some agricultural products. In return, Spain exported to the colonies most of the agricultural and manufactured goods that the colonies needed for survival. Domestic products supplemented these items only to a minor degree.〔 Agriculture, which was limited in the 1500s to providing subsistence for colonial settlements and immediate consumption for workers in the mines, became a dynamic enterprise in the 1600s and replaced mining as the core of the Colombian economy by the 1700s. By the end of the 1700s, sugar and tobacco had become important export commodities. The growth in agriculture resulted in part from the increasing exhaustion of mineral and metal resources in the seventeenth century, which caused the crown to reorient its economic policy to stimulate the agricultural sector.〔 As commercial agriculture became the foundation of the Colombian economy, two dominant forms of agricultural landholdings emerged—the ''encomienda'' and the ''hacienda''. These landholdings were distinguishable by the manner in which the landholders obtained labor. The ''encomienda'' was a grant of the right to receive the tribute of indigenous people within a certain boundary. In contrast, the ''hacienda'' functioned through a contract arrangement involving the owner—the ''hacendado''—and indigenous laborers. Under a typical arrangement, indigenous people tilled the land a specified number of days per week or per year in exchange for small plots of land.〔 The ''encomendero'', or recipient of the ''encomienda'', extended privileges to ''de facto'' control of the land designated in his grant. In effect, the ''encomendero'' was a deputy charged by the crown with responsibility for the support of the indigenous people and their moral and religious welfare. Assuming that the land and its inhabitants were entirely at its disposal, the monarchy envisioned the ''encomiendas'' as a means of administering humane and constructive policies of the government of Spain and protecting the welfare of the indigenous people. The ''encomenderos'', however, sought to employ the indigenous people for their own purposes and to maintain their land as hereditary property to be held in perpetuity. Most ''encomenderos'' were private adventurers rather than agents of the empire. The remoteness of the ''encomiendas'' from the center of government made it possible for the ''encomenderos'' to do as they pleased.〔 Under the influence of church figures such as Bartolomé de las Casas, the crown promulgated the New Laws in 1542 for the administration of the Spanish Empire in America. Designed to remove the abuses connected with ''encomiendas'' and to improve the general treatment of indigenous people, the laws called for strict enforcement of the existing regulations and freedom for the enslaved indigenous people, who were placed in the category of free subjects of the crown, and provided new regulations promoting the well-being of indigenous people. ''Encomenderos'' opposed the royal government's attempts to enforce these regulations. A formula was adopted according to which the laws would be "obeyed but not executed". In addition, the crown eventually granted modifications of the laws at the ''encomenderos request.〔 The institution of the ''hacienda'' with its associated ''mita'' (ancient tribute) system of labor began in the late sixteenth century. After 1590 the crown started to grant titles of landownership to colonists who paid the crown for the land and reserved the right to use indigenous labor on their ''haciendas''. Under an agrarian reform in 1592, the crown established ''resguardos'', or reservations, for the indigenous people to provide for their subsistence; the resulting concentration of indigenous people freed up land to be sold to ''hacendados''. The purchase of land as private real estate from the crown led to the development of ''latifundios''.〔 The new ''hacendados'' soon came into conflict with the ''encomenderos'' because of the ability of the latter to monopolize indigenous labor. The Spanish authorities instituted the ''mita'' to resolve this conflict. After 1595 the crown obliged ''resguardo'' indigenous people to contract themselves to neighboring ''hacendados'' for a maximum of fifteen days per year. The ''mitayos'' (indigenous people contracted to work) also were contracted for labor as miners in Antioquia, as navigational aides on the Río Magdalena, and as industrial workers in a few rare cases. Although the ''mitayos'' were considered free because they were paid a nominal salary, the landowners and other employers overworked them to such an extent that many became seriously sick or died.〔 Because the ''mitayos'' could not survive their working conditions, the crown sought an alternate source of cheap labor through the African slave trade. The crown sold licenses to individuals allowing them to import slaves, primarily through the port at Cartagena. Although the crown initially restricted licenses to Spanish merchants, it eventually opened up the slave trade to foreigners as demand outstripped supply. The mining industry was the first to rely on black slaves, who by the seventeenth century had replaced ''mitayos'' in the mines. The mining industry continued to depend on slave labor into the eighteenth century. Despite the decline of the mining industry, slavery remained the key form of labor; from the second half of the seventeenth century through the eighteenth century, plantation-style agriculture rose in prominence and raised the demand for slave labor on sugar plantations and ranches. Minor segments of the economy also supported slavery and used slaves as artisans, domestic servants, and navigational aides.〔 By the end of the 1700s, the high price of slaves along with increasing antislavery sentiment in the colony caused many to view the system as anachronistic; nonetheless, it was not abolished until after independence was achieved.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Economic history of Colombia」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|