Colonial goods

In economics, colonial goods are goods exported from colonies to other regions. ^[1] Typical colonial goods include coffee, tea, spices, rice, sugar, cocoa and chocolate, and tobacco. ^{[2] [3]}

The introduction of colonial goods can revolutionise consumer habits. ^[4]

At a time when food and agriculture represented a relatively large proportion of overall economic activity, economic statistics often divided traded goods between "colonial goods", "domestic (agricultural and extractive sectors) production" and "manufactured (secondary sector) production".

History

Trade in colonial goods of the day between the metropolitan Greeks and their colonies flourished in ancient times. ^[5]

The term "colonial goods" became less appropriate with the collapse of the western European empires that followed the Second World War. It nevertheless still appeared in books and articles in the 1970s, by now covering not merely agricultural output from (formerly) colonial countries but all long-life staple foods, regardless of provenance, as well as soap, washing powder and petrol/gasoline, and other newly important basic household supplies. ^[6]

Colonial goods stores

Main article: Colonial goods store

Colonial goods stores were retailers specializing in colonial goods. The name is now used generically for grocery stores selling non-perishable items.

Notes

1. Hori, Kazuo (27 May 2016). "The Formation of Capitalism in East Asia". In Sawai, Minoru (ed.). Economic Activities Under the Japanese Colonial Empire. Monograph Series of the Socio-Economic History Society, Japan: ISSN 2364-2408. Springer. p. 26. ISBN   9784431559276 . Retrieved 1 July 2025. Eventually it became economically possible to export colony-grown foodstuffs to mainland Japan, and the exports grew fast [...] previous researches have argued that colonial products benefited the mainland's economy because of their low prices.
2. Hersteller: Julius Meinl, Vienna. "Kolonialwaren (Kaffee, Tee, Kakao), 1. Hälfte 20. Jh" (in German). Technischen Museum Wien. Archived from the original on 2020-02-19. Retrieved 1 January 2015.
3. "Aroma vom Paradies". Der Spiegel (in German). 7 April 1980. Retrieved 1 January 2015.
4. Magaudda, Paolo (2 March 2015). "Consumer Culture, History of". In Cook, Daniel Thomas; Ryan, J. Michael (eds.). The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Consumption and Consumer Studies. Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedias in Social Sciences. Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons. p. 120. ISBN   9780470672846 . Retrieved 1 July 2025. The role of luxury and colonial products was not solely a matter of economic value. These new and rare goods were also important for the cultural changes they gave rise to in consumers' mentality and their attitudes toward material objects. Historians of consumption have highlighted this aspect by focusing on the role of new colonial goods that arrived for the first time in Europe as early as the fifteenth century, such as sugar, tea, and coffee. [...] The diffusion of these commodities forced growing sections of the population to deal with new objects and new meanings of consumption, and introduced the pressure to develop cultural competence in regard to the classification and evaluation of these goods.
5. For example: Plokhy, Serhii (30 May 2017) [2015]. "The Edge of the World". The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine. Basic Books. p. 6. ISBN   9780465093465 . Retrieved 9 May 2025. At the time of [Olbia's] founding and throughout its most prosperous period, the fifth and fourth centuries BC, [...] [t]he Greeks of Olbia and their neighbours not only lived side by side and engaged in commerce but also intermarried [...]. Olbia's merchants and sailors shipped cereals, dried fish, and slaves to Miletus and other parts of Greece, bringing back wine, olive oil, and Greek artisanal wares, including textiles ans metal products, to sell at local markets. There were also luxury items made of gold, as we know from excavations of burial mounds of Scythian kings.
6. Compare: "EUROPAS BROT-UND-BUTTER-PLAN" (in German). Der Spiegel. 1 June 1960. Retrieved 1 January 2015. In Deutschland machen die Agrarimporte reichlich ein Viertel der gesamten Importe aus - da sind schon ausgesprochene Kolonialwaren wie Kakao und Kaffee herausgelassen [...]