Curiously – for it was a dynasty preoccupied with questions of security and sovereignty – the Qing had long allowed itself to be dependent on foreign silver supplies: on imports from South America, gained through Chinese trading in the Philippines, or through exports to Europe. In the forty years up to 1829, Mexico was producing around 80 per cent of the world’s silver and gold. But independence movements between the 1810s and 1820s caused an estimated 56.6 per cent decline in world silver production relative to the 1790s.
