The British Textile Trade in South America in the Nineteenth Century

This is the first work on British textile exports to South America during the nineteenth century. During this period, textiles ranked among the most important manufactures traded in the world market and Britain was the foremost producer. Thanks to new data, this book demonstrates that British exports to South America were transacted at very high rates during the first decades after independence. This development was due to improvements in the packing of textiles; decreasing costs of production and introduction of free trade in Britain; falling ocean freight rates, marine insurance and import duties in South America; dramatic improvements in communications; and the introduction of better port facilities. Manuel Llorca-Jaña explores the marketing chain of textile exports to South America and sheds light on South Americans' consumer behaviour. This book contains the most comprehensive database on Anglo-South American trade during the nineteenth century and fills an important gap in the historiography.

About the Author

Manuel Llorca-Jaña is a Fondecyt research fellow at the University of Chile and is currently a visiting lecturer in world economic history at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Department of Economics and Business). He has published articles in edited collections and in Business History and the Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History. He is also a regular contributor to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Llorca-Jaña's Ph.D. thesis was short-listed for the Coleman Prize in 2011, awarded by the Association of Business Historians to the best Ph.D. thesis in business history. He has presented papers at diverse conferences in Paris, Milan, Utrecht, Venice, Barcelona, London, Leicester, Reading, Nottingham and Swansea.