-
*This work was supported by the Academy of Korean Studies Grant
funded by the Korean Government (MEST) (AKS-2012-DZZ-3103).
Michael Kim ([email protected]) is an Associate Professor in the
Graduate School of International Studies, Yonsei University.
Seoul Journal of Korean Studies 29, no. 2 (December 2016):
305–326.© 2016 Kyujanggak Institute for Korean Studies
Smoking for Empire: The Production and Consumption of Tobacco in
Colonial Korea, 1910–1945*
Michael Kim
Korean historians have long noted the importance of tobacco in
colonial finances and highlighted the economic exploitation of the
farmers and laborers involved in the tobacco production system.
However, the economic history of tobacco production is far more
complex than can be subsumed under the predominant narratives of
colonial exploitation. The production of tobacco in colonial Korea
has to be understood within the broader context of Japan’s imperial
expansion and the regional competition for the East Asian tobacco
market in the early twentieth century. British and American Tobacco
(BAT) was a formidable presence in the region, which forced the
Japanese to concentrate on markets within the Japanese empire. A
new period of expansion commenced after the Manchurian Incident in
1931, and the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937
allowed for the rapid growth of the Japanese tobacco industry in
Manchuria and China. As Japanese imperial tobacco production
expanded in colonial Korea, the commodity had an immense impact on
Korean society and culture. Korean consumers constructed new
cultural meanings and identities around tobacco that varied
considerably depending on one’s social status and position within
Korean society. Through a nuanced examination of tobacco’s
multifaceted interactions within the Japanese empire, we can better
understand many important aspects of colonial Korea’s economy,
society and culture.
Keywords: British American Tobacco (BAT), colonial finance,
tobacco, colonial monopoly, global history of commodities
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306 Michael Kim
On January 4, 2015, controversy erupted in South Korea when that
country’s Ministry of Strategy and Finance (MSF) announced a plan
to reintroduce “rolling tobacco,” or pongch’o, to the Korean market
through the formerly government-run tobacco company KT&G (Korea
Tobacco and Ginseng). At the end of 2014, the Korean government had
raised the cigarette tax and nearly doubled the cost of a pack,
from an average of 2000–3000 wŏn to 4000–5000 wŏn, and now wanted
to provide a cheaper alternative for poor elderly smokers by
selling a form of tobacco that had discontinued production in 1988.
Newspapers quickly noted that rolling tobacco was popular in Korea
just after liberation, when a new cigarette called Sŭngni 勝利, or
“victory,” was outsold by a brand of rolling tobacco called
Changsuyŏn 長壽煙, or “long-life smoke,” that had been popular during
the colonial period (Hankook ilbo, January 6, 2015). Rolling
tobacco brands such as P’ungnyŏnch’o 豐年草, Suyŏn 壽煙, and Hak 鶴
continued to sell for several decades after liberation. During the
early liberation years, cheap rolling tobacco was smoked in a pipe
or hand-rolled into a cigarette with any available piece of paper.
Critics charged that the Korean government had backed away from its
public health goals by reintroducing an unhealthy smoking product
from the past at a discount price.
Most Koreans today are familiar with the controversies over
tobacco taxation and high tariffs on foreign brands, yet few
consider the reasons why the Korean state offers the cheapest
tobacco products among OECD countries despite the public health
risks.1 Historically, the high smoking rates in Korea can be traced
back to the critical role that tobacco played in the Japanese
empire, which established the official monopoly system of the
Government General of Korea (GGK) in 1921, and the reconstitution
of the tobacco monopoly under the Republic of Korea as the
Chŏnmaech’ŏng in 1951. The Korean tobacco market was opened for
foreign imports in the late 1980s, yet the cheaper domestic tobacco
far outsold foreign brands until the early 2000s. The state
monopoly on tobacco production lasted until 2002 when the state
operations became privatized through the launch of KT&G.
Tobacco was a major source of state revenues during the imperial
era, and this situation continued after liberation. The prevalence
of cheap rolling tobacco in Korea, like the brand Changsuyŏn
1. Tobacco had been a major source of state revenues and
providing the product at a low cost for taxation purposes was tied
to fiscal stability. Tobacco also became a symbol of tax resistance
in contemporary Korea as consumers demanded lower tax rates to make
smoking affordable. In 2012, among OECD countries, South Korea had
the second highest smoking rate among males (44.3%) and the lowest
average cost for a pack of cigarettes (2500 wŏn, or approximately
USD$2.3) (Korea Times, September 9, 2012,
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/biz/2012/09/123_119531.html,
retrieved March 23, 2015).
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Smoking for Empire 307
sold in 1945, reflected a market that was aimed at delivering
the cheapest quality tobacco to generate the maximum amount of
profits and taxes. In essence, the monopoly production and taxation
system was so successful that the South Korean state continued the
practice well into the postliberation period.
Korean historians have noted the importance of tobacco to
colonial finances and highlighted the struggle between Korean
producers against the imposition of the colonial monopoly laws
(Chŏng T’aehŏn 1996; Yi Yŏnghak 1991; 2013). The historical
narratives that focus on the economic exploitation of the farmers
and laborers reveal an important aspect of the tobacco production
system. However, the economic history of tobacco production is far
more complex than can be subsumed under the predominant narratives
of colonial exploitation. The production of tobacco in colonial
Korea has to be understood within the broader context of Japan’s
imperial expansion and the intense regional competition for the
East Asian tobacco market in the early twentieth century. The
recovery of tariff controls and the end of extraterritoriality
allowed the Japanese empire to exclude foreign competition from
Japan, South Manchuria, Korea, and Taiwan, but it was far less
successful in neighboring China, which became the largest market in
the world for British and American Tobacco (BAT). The intense
competition from BAT and Chinese producers forced the Japanese to
concentrate on the markets within the Japanese empire, but a new
period of expansion commenced after the Manchurian Incident in 1931
and the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937 opened up
the Manchurian and Chinese markets. The Japanese Imperial Tobacco
Monopoly finally emerged victorious over its Anglo-American rival
when all the areas of BAT tobacco production in China fell into
Japanese hands after 1937.
Korea played a key role in the Japanese empire’s regional
tobacco strategy and served as an important base of operations for
the push into the mainland during the late colonial period.
However, tobacco was more than simply a valuable commodity within
the Japanese empire, for it also had a major impact on colonial
Korean society. Ever since the start of the Japanese occupation,
the large-scale tobacco production served a key role in colonial
finance and significantly transformed Korean society. The
widespread availability of the product encouraged Korean consumers
to construct new cultural meanings and identities around tobacco
that varied depending on one’s social status and position. The
effect of the phenomenal growth of the Japanese empire’s tobacco
production on colonial society is rarely noted among Korean
historians, but this study aims to address both the external
transnational factors behind its expansion and the broad internal
impact on colonial Korea. Through a more
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308 Michael Kim
nuanced examination of the history of tobacco as a commodity
that had multifaceted interactions within the Japanese empire, we
can better understand many aspects of colonial Korea’s economy,
society, and culture.
The Early History of Tobacco in Korea and the Japanese
Empire
The word for tobacco in Korean is tambae, which has a complex
derivation. The Japanese formed the neologism tabako 煙草 (yŏnch’o
in Korean) for tobacco. Koreans changed the Japanese pronunciation
of “tabako” to “tambago,” “tambagu,” and “tambagŭi,” which was
ultimately shortened to “tamba” and “tambae” (Yigong Hagin 1934,
132). Therefore, in Korean tobacco is both tambae and yŏnch’o.
Records from the Chosŏn Dynasty (1392–1910) suggest that tobacco
arrived in Korea via Japan around the late sixteenth and early
seventeenth centuries. Various studies speculate that the arrival
date is sometime before 1614–1618, when the first mentions of
tobacco can be found in Chosŏn Dynasty records. Tobacco usage had
spread extensively by the eighteenth century and farmers grew the
crop for a profit. Some of the Korean literati became concerned
that land that should be devoted to grain production was being used
for a product that was smoked and left behind no significant value.
During the reign of King Yŏngjo (1724–1776) a royal decree even
limited the planting of tobacco, but the production continued to
spread (Yi Yŏnghak 2013, 79–80).
As smoking became an increasingly common practice, it became the
object of social criticism in the late Chosŏn Dynasty. Some of the
controversies surrounding smoking concerned the leveling effect
that the practice could have on the social status system. When
commoners and yangban began to smoke in the same ways, a new set of
social customs had to be devised to maintain the proper
relationships. Younger and socially low Koreans had to avoid
smoking in front of older and higher status Koreans. That meant
commoners could not smoke in front of yangban and women could not
smoke in front of men. Yangban had no limits set on the lengths of
their pipes, while commoners and ch’ŏnmin had to use shorter
lengths (Yi Yŏnghak 1991, 125). Some of these social conventions
still persist in South Korean society today, as it is not
considered polite to smoke in front of one’s seniors or elderly
members of society.
The initial introduction of tobacco had considerable influence
on Korean society, but the second arrival of the commodity in its
modern form during the open ports period (1876–1905) would have a
far more profound impact. Imported tobacco in the nineteenth
century was the vanguard product of
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Smoking for Empire 309
capitalist modernity. The tobacco industry itself did not
achieve a global reach until the invention of the Bonsack cigarette
rolling machine in 1881 turned a product that was once considered a
luxury or novelty item into a mass produced commodity (Cox 2000,
4). The rapid growth of the American cigarette industry had
resulted from the blending of tobacco strains with cured Bright
tobacco which produced a mild and flavorful product that was easier
to inhale (Ibid., 23). By the end of the nineteenth century,
numerous British and American companies competed to export
cigarettes to East Asia, which witnessed a rapid acceptance of the
product. Initially, the high cost of imported tobacco limited its
access to foreigners and Japanese in the port cities. Approximately
90 percent of the imported tobacco at the time was in the form of
cigarettes. The market for imports quickly grew, and foreign
companies began to manufacture tobacco products in Korea after
1894. The Japanese soldiers who arrived in Korea during the
Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) could be seen smoking cigarettes, and
they played a role in spreading the use of the product throughout
Korea. The Kabo Reforms (1894–1896) cabinet pro-mulgated a law that
banned long pipes and enforced hair-cutting, which also had the
impact of increasing cigarette sales. Korean men who cut their hair
short and wore western clothing believed that cigarettes were more
appropriate accessories than the traditional long pipes, and
overall the volume of cigarette imports skyrocketed from 7,205 wŏn
in 1888 to 1.1 million wŏn by 1905 (Yi Yŏnghak 2013,
100–103).
The founding of BAT, which was a merger of the overseas
operations of Anglo-American tobacco companies with its
headquarters in London, in 1902 signaled the arrival of a
formidable competitor to the East Asian market. As Sherman Cochran
notes, “American cigarette manufacturers spoke of China as though
it would provide an endless demand for their product simply by
virtue of its large population, but in their case the market proved
to be no myth” (1980, 10). The sale of American cigarettes in China
at first grew gradually but rose rapidly from 1.25 billion units in
1902 to 12 billion in 1916, when United States cigarette exports to
China exceeded the amount exported to all other nations combined
(Ibid., 11). The American entrepreneur and founder of BAT, James
Duke (1856–1925), had gained control of the Japanese cigarette
company Murai Brothers in the 1890s and had early successes in the
Japanese market. However, the end of extraterritoriality in Japan
in 1899 and the return of tariff controls in 1911 allowed for the
successful creation and operation of the Japanese Imperial Tobacco
Monopoly established in 1904, which forced Duke to sell his
Japanese interests and concentrate instead on China through BAT
(Ibid., 40–41). The Japanese government formed the East Asia
Tobacco
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310 Michael Kim
Company or Tōa tabako kabushiki kaisha 東亞煙草株式會社 to sell tobacco
products in Taiwan, Korea, Manchuria and China. BAT began
production in Korea in 1904 and private Japanese tobacco companies
also arrived after they had been forced out of Japan due to the
imposition of the state monopoly in 1904 (Yi Yŏnghak 2013, 129).
Korean producers experienced great difficulties competing against
the heavily-financed foreign competition, and they lost
considerable ground by the time the Japanese protectorate over
Korea began in 1905. The Japanese quickly dominated the Korean
market, especially when the end of extraterritorial rights in Korea
in 1914 allowed them to impose high tariffs on imports. BAT
withdrew from their Korea operations in 1914, which left the Korean
market entirely to the Japanese. However, during the early
Republican era (1912–1949) the Chinese and Manchurian markets
became a battleground primarily between BAT and the Chinese-owned
Nanyang Brothers Tobacco Company (Benedict 2011, 140). The
inability of the Chinese to gain tariff autonomy allowed BAT to
remain dominant and the Chinese domestic competition made it
difficult for the Japanese to succeed. Therefore, Korea became the
primary focus of the Japanese empire’s tobacco production during
the 1910s and 1920s.
Tobacco and Colonial Finances
Tobacco was a critical component of Japanese rule in Korea from
its beginning. During the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905), Tanetarō
Megata (1853–1926) was appointed financial advisor to the Korean
court in August 1904. He established the Financial Advisory Office
(Chaejŏng komunbu 財政顧問部) and launched what have been called the
Megata Reforms, which firmly tied the Korean economy to Japan.
Considerable controversy persists about how to assess the Megata
Reforms, which reformed the currency and established a centralized
finance system around the Bank of Chosen, whose primary charge was
the discounting of bills of exchange, and a separate system of
development banks (Schiltz 2012, 108–109). The Megata Reforms
instituted a colonial financial structure that was heavily
dependent on monopoly revenues and indirect forms of taxation, such
as on liquor and tobacco. As part of the effort to stabilize Korean
finances, the Japanese began an investigation into the tobacco
production potential of the colony.
One important initiative launched during the Protectorate Period
was the introduction of Bright Yellow tobacco from the United
States. After testing the viability of the seeds in 1906, an
examination of Korean conditions determined
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Smoking for Empire 311
that Ch’ŏngju would be the most suitable location, because its
position on the 37th latitude was within the range of tobacco
growing areas in America, which was 33–38 degrees, and its climate
was also similar (Hatakama 1932, 2–3). Bright Yellow tobacco
production at Ch’ŏngju became an immense success, and it quickly
became one of the three major strains grown in Korea. The locally
grown tobacco was often blended with imported leaf tobacco to
produce the final product. Korean tobacco production consisted of
the “Korean strains,” introduced to Korea before the opening of the
ports in 1876, that had a more bitter taste; “Japanese strains,”
which were popular in Japan; and the Bright Yellow tobacco
introduced at the beginning of the colonial period. The Korean
market had developed a strong preference for the “Korean strains,”
which necessitated the blending of leaf tobaccos to create products
with the right flavor and smoothness to appeal to the local
consumers. Indeed, the ability to grow Bright Yellow tobacco
allowed the colonial government to reduce its reliance on imports
and gain better vertical control of the tobacco industry’s
production.
In 1909, the Japanese protectorate government in Korea passed
the Tobacco Tax Law establishing the foundations for a tax on the
sale and cultivation of tobacco. Following the annexation of Korea
in 1910, the new colonial state promulgated the Tobacco Tax
Ordinance in 1914 and established its tobacco monopoly in 1921. In
effect, the colonial government had introduced a major form of
indirect taxation on consumption to Korea and as much as 25 percent
of the price of tobacco products consisted of taxes (Yi Yŏnghak
2013, 210). As Table One shows, an important characteristic of
colonial finance was a high reliance on indirect taxation on
tobacco and alcohol.
The tobacco taxes and state monopoly were all part of a
long-term plan to establish the fiscal stability of the colonial
government and eliminate the need for financial support from the
Japanese home government. Throughout the colonial period, the GGK
remained under considerable pressure to raise revenue for its
operations, but it was not able to rely on direct taxation due to
the limitations of land taxation and the low taxable income of the
general Korean population. Land was the primary means of direct
taxation until 1934 when the income tax was introduced. Initially,
land taxes generated 51.0 percent of the tax revenues, but this
amount fell to 27.9 percent between 1919–1933, and just .069
percent between 1934–1945 (Table 1). Since land taxes represented a
fixed amount and little new land was added to the tax registries,
the growth in tax revenues could not keep up with the growth of
consumption taxes (Chŏng T’aehŏn 1996, 46). The colonial
government could not become financially self-sufficient before
1945, but tobacco became one of the most reliable sources of
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312 Michael Kim
state revenues. Between 1919–1933 tobacco produced 23.7% of
total tax revenues, and during the 1934–1945 period it generated
23.6 percent of the total. After 1934, income taxes become the
largest category of taxation and all other categories witnessed a
rapid decline. However, tobacco continued to be a major revenue
generator, because the growth of the industry was able to keep up
with income taxes in terms of its proportion of the total
revenues.
Understanding the importance of tobacco revenues to colonial
finances is critical for viewing the overall financial structure of
the Japanese colonial state. All aspects of cultivation,
manufacture, and even the retail sale of tobacco eventually came
under state control because of the critical importance of the
product for state revenues. Initially, the tobacco taxes were
collected at the point of sale and the private production of
tobacco was permitted. Colonial sources often explain that the
“level of civilization,” or mindo, and the prevalent practices in
Korea were too low for consolidation in the early years.2 The
illegal production, withholding sales taxes, and the smuggling of
unauthorized tobacco products greatly undermined the colonial
tobacco tax
2. “Yakushin seru Chōsen no sangyō oyobi shisetsu” [Progress
of Korean industries and facilities], Chōsen oyobi Manshu, June
1937.
Table 1. Direct and Indirect Taxation Revenues by Source (as %
of total)
Direct Taxes Indirect Taxes
1910–1918 60.1 39.1
Land (51.0) Tariffs (30.3)
Tobacco (.05)
Liquor (.041)
1919–1933 33.9 66.1
Land (27.9) Tariffs (20)
Tobacco (23.7)
Liquor (18)
1934–1942 42.1 57.9
Land (.069) Tariffs (.066)
Income (30.2) Tobacco (23.6)
Liquor (12.6)
Sales (.056)
Amusement/food/drink (.045)
Source: Chŏng T’aehŏn (1996, 41).
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Smoking for Empire 313
collection system. Therefore, the state monopolized nearly all
aspects of tobacco production in 1921 to ensure a steady revenue
stream. Tobacco’s role in colonial finance can be compared to
eighteenth-century Europe, where tobacco monopolies were deemed
essential for state finances in France, Spain, Portugal, the
Hapsburg dominions as well as the smaller German and Italian
states.3 Tobacco can serve as a convenient means of taxation during
the early period of modern state formation because of the relative
ease of revenue collection in comparison to other means of
taxation. The incomplete nature of the population census
registration and the underdeveloped local colonial administrations
in Korea made direct taxation highly ineffective. Indirect means of
taxation, therefore, served as a key source of revenue in a
situation when the central state struggled to find effective means
to collect taxes.
The GGK established the colonial monopoly bureau in 1921 to
monopolize the production, distribution, and sale of salt, ginseng,
opium and tobacco. The indirect consumption tax on these four
products in addition to alcohol accounted for the majority of the
colonial state’s revenue. It may be interesting at this point to
note that the production of alcohol was not a state monopoly, but
instead the colonial government regulated the industry by only
allowing producers to sell alcohol if they could manage large-scale
production (Yi Sŭngyŏn 1994, 70). By eliminating small producers
and only licensing the industrial production of alcohol, the GGK
could secure a stable revenue stream. Therefore, not every form of
indirect taxation came from monopoly sources, but the indirect
method of taxation was a key aspect of colonial finances wherein
tobacco became an increasingly dominant product. The colonial state
gained revenues from the production and sales of tobacco as well as
the revenue generated from taxation. Table 2 shows the rapid growth
of tobacco revenues in relation to other monopoly products.
By the 1930s tobacco revenues accounted for over 80 percent of
total monopoly revenues. Total revenues in 1934 were 47,820,244 yen
while costs amounted to 28,969,460 yen, which left a surplus of
18,885,781 yen (Yi Kŏnhyŏk 1936, 333). The 1934 estimated per
capita spending on tobacco was 2 yen per person, and the taxes
collected on tobacco amounted to 5,602,100 yen. The colonial
state’s total revenues can be divided into taxes, revenues from
state-operated companies, bond revenues, and miscellaneous other
revenues. Tobacco production eventually formed 30 percent of state
revenues from state-operated companies for the period 1921–1937
(second only to railroads at 50
3. Price notes (2007, 160) that the percentage of total state
revenues derived from tobacco in the eighteenth century ranged from
6.4 to 7.3 percent in France to at least 25 percent in Spain.
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314 Michael Kim
percent). Therefore, tobacco was a significant source of revenue
in both the categories of state-run companies and taxation (Yi
Yŏnghak 2013, 259–261). The dominance of tobacco revenues in state
finances remained approximately the same during the period
1938–1945 when tobacco revenues skyrocketed to over 100 million yen
a year. This explosive growth of tobacco revenues during the
wartime period allowed it to maintain its leading position in
colonial finances until the end of colonial rule in 1945.
The Culture of Tobacco Consumption
The large scale of tobacco production suggests that this
commodity was just as important as rice in colonial Korean society.
However, in comparison to the numerous studies available on
colonial rice production, little attention has been
Table 2. Colonial State Monopoly Production Value in Korea
(1921–1942) (Unit: x1,000 yen)
Ginseng Opium Salt & Misc. Tobacco
1921192219231924192519261927192819291930193119321933193419351936193719381939194019411942
2103227022252152268927692444306824822449204021001338156717041832181316531729165530203517
122696653----
265198276285750583496107212152395195824364354
4
119411916631215139314931490171017453268433347185694619068066781677882579166
10,22812,75521,778
13,55118,00416,92920,67620,83227,59132,56632,06134,32032,76439,62733,10936,22239,47943,19048,24055,75864,02081,48090,458116,418148,966
Source: Yi Yŏnghak (2013, 264).
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Smoking for Empire 315
paid to the production and consumption of colonial tobacco. The
social and cultural impact of the mass production of tobacco on
colonial Korea is still a little understood topic. As numerous
scholars have pointed out, a careful examination of consumption
culture can provide insight on many important aspects, such as
changing social practices, identity formation, and gender relations
(Jackson 2004). Understanding the manner in which Koreans brought
tobacco into their daily lives can provide us with a glimpse of
what types of everyday transformations took place in the colonial
consumption patterns. As in many other parts of the world, more
expensive cigarette brands were associated with wealthier
lifestyles and modern urban tastes. A distinctive feature of
tobacco use in Korea may be how it impacted the ways ordinary
Koreans, rather than the hyper-wealthy, identified themselves. Only
a small number of Koreans identified themselves with the expensive
tobacco brands. In colonial Korea, the wide-spread availability of
mass-produced rolling tobacco created an association of the product
with simple lifestyles and modest financial means. In fact, the
vast majority of smokers in colonial Korea consumed cheaper rolling
tobacco rather than cigarettes. Within the cigarette market, the
availability of cheaper brands also influenced what might be termed
an emerging “middle class” in the urban centers. The social
significance of the “tobacco divide” in colonial Korea can reveal
the ways in which Koreans interacted with each other and understood
their relative position in colonial society.
In terms of the overall number of smokers in colonial Korea,
estimates vary but one source published by the Colonial Monopoly
Bureau (Chōsen sōtokufu senbaikoku) suggests that there may have
been as many as 5 to 6 million smokers, approximately 28–30 percent
of the population of about 22 million (Nobuhara 1936, 8). The same
source also notes that the average of 2 yen per person is rather
high in comparison with the average Japanese consumption of 4 yen
50 sen since Japanese per capita income was far higher. The
Japanese produced multiple brands of tobacco to divide the Korean
market into various consumer segments. Certain brands of cigarettes
such as Kaida were intended for high-end customers, while less
expensive cigarettes like Macau and the rolling tobacco brands such
as Changsuyŏn 長壽煙 and Hŭiyŏn 囍煙 served the mass market. Table 3
provides a breakdown of the tobacco production by the main
categories, which include kubu 口付 cigarettes which have a 1 cm.
paper holder, yangjŏl 兩切 cigarettes without a paper holder,
powdered tobacco, or segak 細刻, and rolling tobacco, or hwanggak
黃刻:
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316 Michael Kim
Table 3. Production of Tobacco Products (1921–1937) by Units
Kubu cigarettes Yangjōl cigarettes Powdered tobacco Rolling
tobacco
19211922192319241925192619271928192919301931193219331934193519361937
984,9001,645,5401,069,960853,080976,740745,500764,360739,160741,579504,360317,720277,200191,243176,400203,600146,100146,100
2,039,9142,370,3601,894,6393,185,3033,572,9793,521,0323,502,6483,703,9813,956,8043,491,4063,089,5663,237,9683,637,1454,591,2025,109,9285,174,3585,174,358
72,11387,098115,11576,50086,10867,72567,07360,66054,99045,20339,75832,87328,64330,37525,4254725
-
-352,193
2,536,7413,816,4435,391,36710,796,16010,961,34412,479,44413,399,95814,972,73114,294,45614,841,86816,095,54516,801,99517,351,49615,063,26015,063,260
Source: Chōsen sōtokufu senbaikoku (1938, 121–123)
The steady growth of yangjŏl cigarettes reflects the expansion
of the middle market segment that generated the greatest proportion
of revenues. Another important aspect is the spectacular growth of
the cheapest forms of rolling tobacco, from 352,000 units in 1922,
to a peak of 17 million in 1935, and then falling back to 15
million in 1937. Throughout the colonial period, the yangjŏl
cigarettes generated the largest share of the revenues, but the
cheapest market segment grew most rapidly through the expansion of
rolling tobacco consumption. In 1937, total tobacco revenues
amounted to 55 million yen, of which .98 million yen came from kubu
cigarettes, 32.58 million yen from yangjŏl cigarettes, and 20.95
million yen from rolling tobacco (Yi Yŏnghak 2013, 239). For that
same year, 9.39 million of the 15 million rolling tobacco units
were the cheapest brand, Hŭiyŏn, while among the yangjŏl
cigarettes the most popular was the economically priced Macao
(pronounced Mako by Koreans), which comprised 3.22 million out of
5.17 million unit produced (Chōsen sōtokufu senbaikoku 1938,
120–121). Data shows that the tobacco market generated the most
revenue from Mako, the mid-priced brand of cheapest cigarettes,
while the cheapest brand of rolling tobacco, Hŭiyŏn, served as an
affordable entry-level product that enabled the colonial state to
collect revenues from a far larger proportion of the population. In
a sense, tobacco production allowed the state to expand the tax
base among the Korean
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Smoking for Empire 317
population and implement the ‘micro-taxation’ of the poorest
segments of the Korean population.
The various brands of tobacco offer us a fascinating window into
how Koreans divided themselves into different status groups based
on their con-sumption patterns. Kim Tongin (1900–1951), in his
critique of the writer Yi Kwangsu (1892–1950), provides an example
of how that author was so far removed from the lifestyle of the
average impoverished Korean that his stories lacked realism. In one
of his fictional works, Yi Kwangsu depicts the filial piety of a
young farmer by having him purchase his mother a package of
Changsuyŏn, and Kim Tongin points out that this brand was only
smoked in the cities (Kim Tongin 1939, 199–200). Kim Tongin further
explains that the rural areas of Korea smoke the cheaper Hŭiyŏn
brand and the tobacco that Yi associated with the urban poor was
actually too expensive for those living in the countryside. Kim
Tongin’s observation coincides with the writings found in a
Kaebyŏk article published in January 1935, where the author
introduces himself as a simple man who does not fit the urban image
of a Seoulite:
Everyone knows that I do not own a single piece of property, not
even tiny plot of farmland. Other than a house, a wife, and two
children all you will get from shaking out my pockets are a few
flakes of Hŭiyŏn. Since my wife is not really my private
property, I can’t really include her in this list. (Sim Hun 1935,
8)
A package of the cheapest Hŭiyŏn represented an impoverished
lifestyle to colonial writers who used the image of tobacco flakes
as a sign of a modest existence. Colonial pundits at times worried
about the heavy financial burden of smoking on the rural
population. An article published in Tonggwang on May 1931 explains
that the average farmer must sell one sŭng 升 of rice—roughly
equivalent to 7.5 cups—to purchase a single pack of tobacco (Sang
Hae 1931, 14). Rural tobacco use continued to grow throughout the
colonial period, and was only curtailed by wartime shortages that
made it difficult to supply all of the regions of Korea.
Among the urban residents of Seoul, the brand Mako was
considered a modest brand of cigarettes that represented a “middle
class” status, because it cost only 5 sen for a pack of 10.
However, this modest brand of cigarette was insufficient for
gaining entry into the exclusive world of urban pleasures. The
writer An Hoenam (1909–?) explains that when knocking on the door
of a kisaeng establishment, one must prepare the price of
admission, which is either a 10-sen pack of Pigeon or a 15-sen pack
of Kaida (An Hoenam 1934, 136). The madam at the door will ask for
the “admission ticket.” An Hoenam notes
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318 Michael Kim
that one need not bring any money to a kisaeng establishment for
a conversation, but anyone who came without preparing the
appropriate pack of cigarettes would be refused admission. Koreans
were highly familiar with the different costs of the various
tobacco products, and everyday consumption habits became signs of
one’s social status.
Cigarettes had more complex meanings for women smokers due to
their initial rarity. As Kerry Segrave notes (2005, 8), by the
1870s a connection between women smoking cigarettes and immorality
had already been established in Western societies. The early Korean
female smokers were mostly kisaeng courtesans and café workers, who
were also among the first women to adopt expensive Western
fashions. The cigarette’s association with a decadent urban
everyday lifestyle created a negative association with the women
who were seen indulging in a pleasure that was unavailable to the
general population. Even after smoking became gradually accepted
among a wider range of women, the negative images associated with
this expensive everyday product persisted. One author writing
during the late colonial period in 1941 described the disconcerting
experience of seeing two women smoking at a nearby table:
These days, kisaeng or café girls can occasionally be seen
smoking in stations or movie theaters. At first we didn’t think
much of it and pretended not to see them. However, as we
unconsciously looked in their direction and examined the sight
carefully, no matter how much we might try to dismiss them, they
did not seem to be kisaeng or café girls. Instead, their clothes
and manner suggested they were women of the middle class or above.
Thus it’s hard to say that we were disappointed in them or that we
felt contempt for them, but it’s difficult to know what we felt
about the situation. (Ko Yŏnghwan 1941, 225)
The author continues, wondering if the women understood just how
much damage they were doing to their health and their unborn
children by smoking. Ideas of proper motherhood and reproductive
health became woven into criticisms of women smokers. The degree of
surprise expressed at women smokers in the late colonial period
suggests that social morals were not quite ready to accept female
cigarette smokers emerging from among Korea’s elite classes.
However, the Korean men who had trouble with a Korean woman smoking
a cigarette rarely commented negatively about the sight of a woman
of low social status smoking Hŭiyŏn from a cheap pipe in rural
Korea. The colonial state’s market segmentation strategy became
reflected in the cultural adaptation of tobacco by colonial Korean
society. The cultural impact of tobacco consumption leaves little
doubt that the Japanese empire’s production of the commodity had a
major transformative impact on the colony.
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Smoking for Empire 319
Tobacco and Wartime Korea
During the 1920s and 1930s, the history of tobacco in the
Japanese empire was largely limited to Japan, Korea, South
Manchuria, and Taiwan. The Japanese had extreme difficulties
competing outside the Japanese empire against BAT, which had
absorbed its international rivals like Liggett and Myers and held a
dominating lead in the Chinese market. BAT sales went from 26
billion cigarettes in 1928 to 42 billion in 1929 and then achieved
a high of 55 billion cigarettes in 1937 (Benedict 2011, 142). The
Japanese East Asia Tobacco Company attempted to expand its presence
in the Chinese market but struggled against the frequent boycotts
of Japanese products that took place throughout the 1920s (Cochran
1980, 196). The establishment of Manchukuo in 1932 allowed the
Japanese Imperial Tobacco Monopoly to become competitive in Asia
outside of the Korean market. The Japanese established Manshu
tobako 滿洲煙草 in 1934, which was capitalized at 12,000,000 yen, and
opened numerous factories in Manchuria.4 BAT was able to remain
competitive in Manchuria during the 1930s but the outbreak of the
Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937 would become a decisive event that
allowed Japanese tobacco to finally control the Chinese market.
The opportunities for expansion on the mainland after 1931
brought forth a major transformation of the colonial Korean tobacco
industry. The colonial tobacco production entered a new era of
growth that was connected to the rapidly emerging market in
Manchuria and China. The Japanese empire’s infrastructure
investment into colonial Korean tobacco production provided a base
of operations for the push into the mainland. Table 4 displays the
growth of revenues and expenses for the colonial tobacco monopoly
during 1930–1942.
The above data shows a major revenue increase in the mid-1930s
and explosive growth after the war began in 1937. Prior to the war
there had been two tobacco factories in Korea, located in Seoul and
Taegu, but during the war two more factories were built in Chŏnju
and P’yŏngyang to expand tobacco production. The outbreak of the
war generated considerable excitement in the colonial media about
the possibilities of the China market for colonial tobacco. An
article in Chōsen kōron in November 1937 notes that Northern
China was a 100 million yen market for BAT, and that a colonial
Korean monopoly official
4. “Manshu tabako shinkyo kōjō wo kakuchō” [Expansion of
Manchuria Tobacco’s factory in Shinkyō], Yakushin jidai, July
1937.
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320 Michael Kim
had been dispatched to the region to examine the tobacco
situation.5
The outbreak of hostilities greatly impacted the trade in leaf
tobacco in the region. During the 1920s and 1930s, the majority of
the three varieties of tobacco produced in Korea was used for
Korean consumption, and only the remainder was exported. Most of
the imports to colonial Korea had been Bright Yellow leaf tobacco,
primarily from China but also a significant amount from the United
States. There had been almost no market for finished tobacco
products before the war outside of Korea due to the fierce
competition from BAT and Chinese tobacco producers. Table 5 shows
the growth of exports and imports between 1930 and 1942.
The war presented both challenges for acquiring leaf tobacco
from the United States as well as new opportunities for the export
of Bright Yellow tobacco from Korea to overseas markets (Kinoshita
Rintaro 1938). The colonial monopoly had to become more
self-sufficient in tobacco production and invest more resources
into the production of leaf tobacco for the export market. Table 5
shows how the colonial tobacco industry went from a major importer
of leaf tobacco to an exporter in the late 1930s, which is a trend
that escalated quickly as the war intensified. An October 1939
issue of the journal Chōsen kōron noted that the Sino-Japanese
War was not just a military conflict but also a trade war between
the Imperial Japanese Tobacco Monopoly and the Anglo-
5. “Sensan tabako ga hokushi ni daishingun” [Korean tobacco’s
great march to North China], Chōsen kōron, November 1937,
105.
Table 4. Tobacco Monopoly Revenues and Expenses (1930–1942)
(Unit: x1,000 yen)
Revenues Expenses Profits
1930193119321933193419351936193719381939194019411942
3,8684,6284,0214,4004,7825,2195,7936,5967,6339,43310,47813,65517,427
2,1102,2412,2322,4012,8973,1173,3063,5283,8374,3854,9286,2587,576
1,7582,3871,7892,0001,8852,1022,4873,0693,7965,0495,5507,3969,851
Source: Yi Yŏnghak (2013, 268).
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Smoking for Empire 321
American BAT.6 The looming conflict meant that the Japanese had
to reduce tobacco consumption in Korea so that they would have more
available for military use and the export of leaf tobacco to other
parts of East Asia.
As the war progressed Colonial Monopoly Bureau officials began
to refer to the “tobacco block” that was emerging in East Asia
under Japanese dominion (Yi Pyŏngsŏk, 1940a, 19–23). While
discussion of the autarkic “yen block” had appeared since the start
of the war, tobacco was one of the key products that the Japanese
were able to gain control of in East Asia. Table 6 shows the rapid
growth of tobacco exports after the outbreak of the Second
Sino-Japanese War.
Table 6. The Japanese Empire’s Tobacco Exports to the “Tobacco
Block” (in yen)
1937 1938 1939
Amount Value Amount Value Amount Value
JapanKoreaTaiwan
2,339,281509,580
1560
2,254,087271,924
1479
5,801,9272,401,230281,364
4,541,6871,201,008111,861
10,244,5003,627,720230,580
8,680,2541,857,877154,071
Source: Yi Pyŏngsŏk (1940b, 19).
6. “Ittokoku no jinkō nichi ei tabako sen” [Japanese-British
tobacco war for the nation with the largest population], Chōsen
kōron, October 1939, 74–75.
Table 5. The Import and Export of Leaf Tobacco in Colonial Korea
(1930–1942) (in yen)
Exports Imports
1930193119321933193419351936193719381939194019411942
557,526621,513
1,036,733808,952453,679272,889426,537271,923
1,201,0081,857,8772,413,2304,411,6706,194,451
3,067,4531,056,607772,913
1,604,8345,441,9684,342,8275,655,914891,557487,80783,579190,163187,515625,644
Source: Yi Yŏnghak (2013, 272).
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322 Michael Kim
Most of the Korean exports went to Manchuria as Bright Yellow
leaf tobacco, but a growing amount was exported to Northern China.
While the majority of finished tobacco products within the Japanese
empire had been exported from Japan to Taiwan before 1937, the war
provided a new opportunity for colonial Korean tobacco exports,
especially to supply the Japanese military (Yi Pyŏngsŏk, 1940b,
20). The tobacco production of the entire empire increased
significantly in the 1930s, but, as Table 7 shows, Korea and
Manchuria generated the highest growth rate among finished tobacco
product revenues.
The continued expansion of colonial Korean tobacco during the
wartime period was a challenge that was met through a focus on
military production. The most popular cigarette brand, Mako, which
had represented an urban middle-class lifestyle during most of the
colonial era, was rebranded Hŭnga 興亞, or “Rise of Asia,” in
December 1939 to reflect the wartime situation (Tonga ilbo,
December 1, 1939). Hŭnga, along with the brand Sakura, became
known throughout the East Asian warfront as colonial Korean
cigarettes. While comprehensive data on finished tobacco exports
are not available for the entire war period, the 1939 data shows
that out of the 1,079,828,000 units and 2,397,925 yen of exports
that year, 332,965,000 units and 982,933 yen were exported to
Mongolia, while most of the remainder went to the Japanese army
(Chōsen sōtokufu senbaikoku 1940, 190–191). The rise in exports
created cigarette shortages in Korea, with some consumers
complaining in March 1940 that the only tobacco available for sale
was the Hŭnga brand despite the increase in production (Maeil
sinbo, March 26, 1940). The tobacco production for the Japanese
army became a notable aspect of wartime Korean society. Tobacco
became a staple item of the wian or “comfort” packages sent to
soldiers serving in the war. An August 1941 article in Sinsidae
explains that in May of 1941 a total of 220,000 packs and in June a
total of 260,000 packs were donated to Japanese soldiers. The
article reports that since the outbreak of hostilities in 1937 a
total of 6.25 million packs had been sent to the warfront as
Table 7. Tobacco Revenues in the Japanese Empire (1933–1937) (in
yen)
1933 1934 1935 1936 1937Growth
Rate
JapanKoreaTaiwanManchuria
268,998,34425,313,1682,455,31015,374,579
288,761,60139,025,6762,644,37215,879,609
295,674,05942,926,2862,885,28117,898,405
313,021,86647,805,8342,977,00219,995,627
353,850,70156,025,6633,096,43225,094,371
33%59%26%61%
Source: Yi Pyŏngsŏk (1940c, 22).
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Smoking for Empire 323
part of comfort packages.7 The colonial tobacco industry became
an indispen-sable part of the military production that supplied the
Japanese military forces pushing BAT out of the Chinese market. The
Japanese destroyed many Chinese cigarette factories during their
advance, but they did not damage BAT’s operations, which they took
over to continue the tobacco production. BAT was able to continue
its China operations until the outbreak of war with the United
States in 1941 forced them to suspend their operations there, and
the facilities became absorbed into the Japanese empire’s tobacco
production (Cochran 1980, 198–199).
Conclusion
The Japanese empire’s “tobacco war” in East Asia with the
Anglo-American BAT had ended in a complete victory for the Japanese
Imperial Tobacco Monopoly. Colonial Korea’s role in this
decades-long struggle has not been fully appreciated in previous
studies on the topic since a transnational perspective is necessary
to understand the full significance of the commodity’s history in
the region. Tobacco is a product that required considerable capital
investment to be competitive in the global market. The Japanese
empire repealed its unequal treaties and ended the
extraterritoriality status for Western powers just as tobacco began
to arrive in its modern form. Therefore, the Japanese were able to
develop an extensive tobacco industry without having to compete
against the well-financed foreign competition. In a sense, one of
the unintended consequences of the Japanese occupation of Korea was
that the colony became incorporated into the Japanese Imperial
Tobacco Monopoly rather than BAT’s global pro-duction system.
Through the continuous import of leaf tobacco from places like the
United States and Turkey, colonial Korean production was not
completely isolated from the global production of tobacco. However,
the imposition of the colonial monopoly system meant that the
marketing, images, and associations that emerged in colonial Korea
followed its own distinct path as tobacco impacted colonial society
and culture.
Tobacco production during the colonial period was an important
part of a colonial order that could only implement a limited direct
taxation scheme. Tobacco became the primary revenue generator for
the colonial state in the form of indirect taxes, and the
segmentation of the colonial tobacco market into
7. “Aeguk pando ch’onghu chŏksŏng” [Readiness of the home
front of the patroitic peninsula], Sinsidae, August 1941, 212.
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324 Michael Kim
different brands and products reflects various strategies to
deliver the product to the highest number of customers possible. An
entire set of everyday practices emerged around each group of
tobacco consumers that occupied different segments of colonial
Korean society. The example of the author Yi Kwangsu not being
aware of what brand the poorest Koreans smoked suggests the
coexistence of different life-worlds that were separate from each
other. Colonial Korea was clearly fractured into different social
groups that did not occupy the same homogenized spaces of
consumption. Sorting through these social layers may offer us new
insights into how consumption practices generated vastly different
everyday life experiences reflecting global patterns, but also how
they developed along more localized social interactions.
The history of tobacco in Korea was ultimately shaped by the
ambition of Japanese colonial officials to make smoking a key
aspect of the autarkic yen block that began to emerge after the
Manchurian Incident in 1931. Japanese expansion on the Asian
mainland opened new opportunities for the growth of colonial
tobacco, especially through the important role that it played in
supplying the Japanese army with cigarettes. Hoi-eun Kim observes
that some everyday products like Seirogan hide a complex imperial
past that is largely forgotten today (Hoi-eun Kim 2013, 251). Yet
through an examination of the history of the product we can achieve
a deeper understanding of how events taking place on the broader
level of state and society can also shape everyday lives. The past
associations of tobacco with the Japanese empire and militarism
were forgotten when liberation arrived in 1945, and Koreans
acquired entirely new meanings behind their smoking habits. The
ever ubiquitous brand Hūnga became rebranded as Paektusan to link
the product with Korean mythology and mask its imperial origins
(Tonga ilbo, February 15, 1947). Smoking gained a new set of
symbolic significances as the tobacco monopoly reestablished itself
under the Republic of Korea to again play a key role in the
finances of the postcolonial nation-state.
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