Heartland, Hinterland, and the staple Trade

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Heartland, Hinterland, and the staple Trade
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The Staple Thesis

• Developed by Harold Innis
• Argues that the main reason for Europes desire
  to expand its empire was to gain more resources
  for the country at home.
• Development was based on the resources available.

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Three Ways a Staple Economy Develops

• An economy is most successful when it expands
  beyond simple resource extraction and into
  manufacturing.
• An economy is moderately successful when it has
  the ability to shift from one staple to another.
• An economy is unsuccessful when it becomes
  totally dependant on one staple and it does not
  provide enough income
• i.e fishing in Newfoundland.

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Mercantilism and staple Resources

• European Expansionism was initially fuelled with
  the hopes of discovering vast quantities of Gold.
• Gold was the measure of wealth for a nation like
  our dollar is today.
• Everything was traded according to its value in
  gold.

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Mercantilism Cont.

• The nations of Europe treated its colonies as
  hinterlands (outside the home country) and used
  their resources primarily to the benefit of the
  heartland (the home country)
• The colonies also provided a new market for the
  manufactured goods that were produced from the
  original resources.

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Mercantilism

• Goods that were in high demand and were easily
  available provided the greatest wealth to the
  heartland.
• Resources that required immediate processing also
  created jobs in the colonies.

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Mercantilism

• Both furs and Fish were in High demand and
  abundant supply which gave the northern colonies
  an advantage over the southern us colonies.

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Feeding EuropeThe Cod Fishery

• In the 1400s, Europe was faced with a crisis in
  providing enough food for its citizens.
• The demand for fish exceeded what was available
  since it was cheaper than meat.
• Europe also had a large Roman Catholic population
  that did not eat meat on Friday.

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The Cod Fishery

• The discovery of Cod of Newfoundland provided a
  way out of the crisis and justified the great
  expense of setting up a colony.
• John Cabot discovered the resource however
  England did not have an monopoly on the fishing.

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• England was joined by fishing fleets from France,
  Spain, Portugal and Dutch fleets.
• Records showed that 250 ships from England and
  200 400 fleets from France frequented the
  fishing grounds on the grand banks of
  Newfoundland.

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The Cod Fishery

• Cod was processed in two ways Wet and Dry
• Wet Cod was processed by filleting and cleaning
  the fish and then preserving it with salt. IT
  was then shipped back to the homeland.
• This method was used primarily by the French,
  Portuguese, and Spanish since they had a great
  amount of salt resources.

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• Another way to process fish is by Dry fishing
• The fish had to be taken ashore, cleaned, salted,
  and dried on flakes. This method did not require
  as much salt.
• This was primarily used by English fleets since
  they did not have an abundance of salt.

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• Since fishers had to work onshore they had to
  establish temporary settlements to process the
  fish.
• This eventually led to permanent settlements
  which in turn led to the colonization of North
  America.

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Timber Trade

• In the early 1800s, Timber and wheat became the
  newest staple commodities.
• The expansion of these industries marked the
  beginning of full scale development of colonial
  economies.

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• Britain had a great demand for timber since it
  needed to build ships for its Navy.
• Britain also exhausted their own supplies of
  Timber and it was expensive to buy it from other
  countries.
• The North American Colonies supplied the solution
  and almost overnight timber became the most
  traded resource in North America replacing furs
  and fish.

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• The timber trade also had one major difference.
• It produced a secondary industry, Shipbuilding.
• The cities of Halifax, Saint John, and Yarmouth
  sprung to international fame as the worlds
  premier shipbuilders.

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Wheat

• Like Timber, Britain was facing a crisis from a
  shortage of wheat.
• Britain looked towards North America once again
  for a supply.
• The British also imposed the corn Laws which were
  restrictive tariffs on all grain products from
  other nations.
• Britain's colonies were exempt from the tariffs
  and granted preferential trade status.

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• This gave the North American farmers a distinct
  advantage over other nations and gave them a
  monopoly of the richest market in the world.
• North American farmers were able to charge a
  lower price for their wheat.

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Impact of the Wheat Trade

• The wheat trade became the foundation of the
  upper Canadian economy.
• This caused great population expansion and new
  developments sprung up.
• Canals and roads were built.
• Flour mills were constructed to process grain.
• This was the beginning of central Canadas status
  as the heartland of the colony.

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Repeal of Preferential Trade Status

• While preferential trade was great for the
  colonies, the merchants in Britain were not
  happy.
• The tariffs were stifling their business since it
  cost so much to import goods that were not
  processed in North America.

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Impact of Tariffs

• The merchants forced the government to drop the
  tariffs and the preferential treatment given to
  North America was revoked.
• This was disastrous for the North American
  economy as they now had to compete with other
  nations that were located closer to Britain and
  did not have the same transportation costs.

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Reciprocity Treaty

• Faced with a depression, the colony needed to
  find a new market.
• Luckily they had the fastest growing economy in
  the world located next door.
• The U.S was on track to outpace Britain
• The reciprocity treaty was negotiated between
  Britain and the U.S remove all trade barriers
  between the two.
• All tariffs were removed and both sides could
  trade freely between one another.

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The National Policy
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• The National policy consisted of three parts
• Tariffs, Transcontinental railways, and
  settlement of the west
• The purpose of tariffs was to protect the
  manufacturing industries in the colony.

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Protective Tariffs

• Protective tariffs charged a 40 per cent duty on
  imports.
• They were applied to goods that were also
  produced in the colony.
• The theory is If you charge more money to
  companies for importing foreign goods, they will
  be more likely to purchase locally.
• The Local businesses were protected.

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• Another development from the National policy was
  the need for the economy to expand in the
  manufacturing industry
• The only way they could do this and compete with
  the U.S was to create a transcontinental
  railroad.

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• It was feared that the West would be taken over
  by the U.S unless it was settled.
• The railroad increased settlement drastically.
• Communities could now be connected to the large
  growing markets of central Canada.

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Heartland

• Canadas heartland is and has always been located
  in central Canada.
• By 1901, over half of the manufacturing was
  located in Ontario and a third in Quebec.
• Tariff protection allowed for investment with
  very little risk and competition.

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Hinterland

• With Central Canada being the heartland, The West
  and the Maritimes were the hinterland.
• Halifax would be the port of call for the country
  as goods would move into and out of Canada.

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Impact on the Maritimes

• Initially the railway brought great investment in
  the Maritimes.
• All along the railway industrial centres formed.
• Truro, New Glasgow, Amherst and Sydney had large
  factories that produced everything from iron and
  steel to textiles and pianos.
• Nova scotias coal resources also suggested that
  its economy would be on the rise.

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• Maritime prosperity did not last.
• The larger firms in central Canada eventually
  bought out companies in the Maritimes, especially
  those in the Banking sector.
• These firms only thought about profits and did
  not care about community development in the
  Maritimes.
• Capital was moved back to the heartland.

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• To make up for this decline Nova Scotia focused
  mainly on Coal production that was needed to fuel
  the growing heartland.
• The merchants in central Canada pressured the
  government to end the protection tariffs on coal
  so they could use cheaper imports from the U.S.
• The government agreed which had a disastrous
  effect on the Nova Scotia economy

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• Between 1881 and 1931, the maritimes suffered a
  steady net migration.
• 500000 people left Nova Scotia for New England

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Impact on the West

• Like the Maritimes, the prairie communities did
  not develop into industrial centres like Toronto
  and Montreal.
• They were too for away from large markets.
• The immigration to the west also did not happen
  as many people went to the us where they were
  giving land away very cheaply.

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Industrialization

• Working conditions in the factories were harsh.
• People worked long days of 12 hours or more.
• Failure to meet these demands meant loss of wages
  and even physical punishment. Disease and
  workplace accidents were common.

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Standard of Living

• Times were very difficult for families.
• While work opportunities for women were very
  limited, if a young couple good both find jobs
  they could earn a modest living.
• When women left work to have children, they lost
  their jobs and the family would plunge into
  poverty.

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• In Urban centres housing was in great demand
  which led to increased rents.
• Many times families would share dwellings.
• In most of the poor dwellings there was no
  electricity, sewers, or running water.
• Malnutrition and disease affected many people and
  there was a high infant mortality and death rate.

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The Social Response to Industrialization

• Eventually people realized that not everyone was
  benefiting from industrialization.
• Alcoholism, child abuse, and poverty were the
  main issues facing the poor and middle classes.
• This created a wave of social spending and
  iniatives.

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• Prohibition was enacted to stop alcoholism,
  prostitution, and child abuse.
• Improving healthcare was a new priority. School
  vacination and nutrition programes were created
• Public sanitation
• Sunday was made the Lords day and no one
  worked.

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Workers Response

• Workers also began to fight for better
  conditions.
• They wanted a share of profits
• Higher wages, shorter hours and better working
  conditions
• They began collective bargaining and forming
  unions. Strikes were common.
• This began to form the basis of Canadas sense of
  social responsibility.