Sailing to European entrepots: Romanian farming and the Antwerp international grain market (1881-1914)
Sailing to European entrepots: Romanian farming and the Antwerp international grain market (1881-1914)

Summary/Abstract: This study shows how grain produced in Moldavia and Wallachia were integrated into the international market in Antwerp. The research conducted so far does not include in-depth reviews of how Moldo-Wallachian production structures and the entire trade chain were boosted by Belgium’s substantial grain imports. Beyond the classical historiography on the subject, this article draws on recent studies and unpublished statistical data from Belgian and Romanian archives. At the same time, it aims to show how the infrastructure of the western Black Sea foreland maximised the agricultural and commercial potential of the Danube hinterland. The paper contributes to the research on the expansion of the grain trade in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, by looking at the contribution of Eastern Europe, more specifically, Romania. This would be a welcome addition, since existing studies often emphasise the contribution of Northern American grain, while that of Eastern Europe was also impressive. At the end of the 19th century, a connection was created between the ports of the Lower Danube and the entrepôt in Antwerp, a connection that was indispensable for the two ends of the network but also for the business environment. Once in the storehouses on the banks of the Scheldt estuary, Romanian grain was placed on the markets of Western Europe at the right time by the skilled merchants of the most important international trading houses.

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