Food Imperialism around the World ...............................................

Lecture 30

F

rom the late 19th century up to World War I, industrial food production
began to have impacts on a global scale. In this lecture, you will learn
how regions outside of Europe and America were linked to the global
economy and were increasingly controlled by the interests and desires of
affl uent consumers in the wealthier countries of the world. You will learn
how modern industrial processing affected the rest of the world, which was
apparently just waiting to be modern.

Industrialized Nations and Their Colonies
 Manufacturers in the industrialized nations—England, France,
Belgium, Germany, northern Italy, and the United States, and soon
to catch up, Japan—want two things: new markets in which to sell
their mass-produced goods (including processed foods) and raw
materials (including food) that unconquered regions might provide.

 Often, they promote colonization without even knowing what they

might fi nd in these places, but under the assumption that there may

be something there and that they might as well gobble it up before

some other country does. They were also thinking that given the

climate (most of these regions are tropical or subtropical), they

could at least create plantations to grow food, which can now be

shipped more effi ciently in new steamships and refrigerated trains.

 Specifi cally, European powers scramble to carve up Africa and

Asia between them and build themselves empires. The results of

imperialism can be devastating to local inhabitants, even when

Europeans brought with them the trappings of what they considered

progress, advancement, and religion. In the process, they also

destroyed indigenous cultures and ways of life, particularly

traditional foodways. Perhaps more importantly, they made those

people dependent on the colonial empires.