MENG-TZU

Pinyin Mengzi, town in southern Yunnan sheng (province), China. In the 19th century, Meng-tzu was a trading centre for commerce between the interior of Yunnan and the HanoiHaiphong area of Indochina. Communications were inconvenient: goods were shipped to Ho-k'ou on the Indochinese border by junk, transferred by small craft to Man-hao, and then taken 37 miles (60 km) by pack animal to Meng-tzu. Despite these difficulties, Meng-tzu was an important port of entry not only into Yunnan but also into western Kweichow province and in 1889 was opened to foreign trade as a treaty port. Most of this foreign trade was in tin and opium. The importance of Meng-tzu was ended by the construction of the French railway from Haiphong to K'un-ming in 190610. This railway bypassed Meng-tzu, but in 1915 a branch line was built via the town to the Ko-chiu tin mines. Apart from a brief respite during the early days of World War II, the town of Meng-tzu has, nevertheless, steadily declined in importance ever since. Ko-chiu became a county in 1912. Pop. (mid-1980s est.) 10,00050,000.