Cebu exports in the 1890s
In the La Isla de Cebu and the special reports of the Philippine Commission notes of the exports of Cebu to many countries. It is fascinating to know that in the years 1890 to 1891, England received the biggest share of hemp exported from Cebu, totaling 13,886 tons, while the United States and Canada received only 4,268 tons. Both destinations received almost equal shares in sugar exports and 3,060 tons going to England and 3,475 tons to the United States and Canada. Hong Kong bought only 5.057 tons of sugar during the same years. Exports for this two-year period were loaded in 28 ships directly from the port of Cebu.
In 1896, Japan entered into the picture by buying 1.062 tons of sugar exported from Cebu. Hong Kong’s share of sugar exports increased to 4.044 tons in this year alone, compared to England’s 717 tons and the United States and Canada’s 1,878 tons. The hemp buyer’s picture in 1896 also changed; the United States and Canada’s 7,653 tons beat England’s 4,911 tons.
In the following year (1897), 5.050 tons of Cebu sugar were sold to England while 10,207 tons were sold to Japan and Hong Kong. None was sold to the United States.
In the twenty-year period covering 1890 to 1899, sugar exports from Cebu Port totaled 310,939 tons or an average of 15,546 tons annually.
Although hemp and sugar were already export items decades ago, copra entered into the export picture only in the 1890s. Copra export showed a continual increase; 1,219 tons in 1894, 2,772 in 1895, 3.075 and 2,901 in 1897. Due to the Cebu’s revolt in 1898, copra plunged to a low 660 tons. But rose again to 4.142 tons in 1899. That same year, the Americans arrived in the Philippines and became the new administrators after Spain sold the country to the United States via the document called Treaty of Paris signed on December 10, 1898 in the amount of 20 million dollars.
Dionisio Sy, in his book “A Short History of Cebu,” quoted a report from the weekly El Boletin de Cebu of a “price manipulation.” This is how it was reported: “The growth in the export trade, however, did not necessarily mean better conditions for the small farmers and tenants. In 1899, the export firms in Cebu were accused of manipulating prices to the detriment of producers. They were, one critic maintained, “sucking the blood of the native (farmers).
“Defenders of the export firms claimed that they were only acting according to the laws of commerce and passed the blame on the “acaparadores” or middle-men, alleging that the exploiters were those who buy a picul of sugar in the towns at four reales (40 centavos), taking advantage of the misery or the vice of the Indio, in order to sell it in Cebu at three pesos, or perhaps more.”
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