Editing Industrial espionage (section)

===British East India Company===
In 1848, the [[British East India Company]] broke [[Qing China]]'s global near-[[monopoly]] on tea production by smuggling Chinese tea out of the nation and copying Chinese tea-making processes.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/08/tea-time/535590/ |last1=Twilley |first1=Nicolla |last2=Graber |first2=Cynthia |title=Britain's Great Tea Heist |website=[[The Atlantic]] |date=2 August 2017 |access-date=September 30, 2022}}</ref> The [[British Empire]] had previously run a considerable trade deficit with China by importing the nation's [[tea]] and other goods. The British attempted to rectify the [[Deficit spending|deficit]] by trading [[opium]] to the Chinese, but encountered difficulties after the [[Daoguang Emperor]] banned the opium trade and the [[First Opium War]] broke out. To avoid further issues in trading tea with China, the East India Company hired [[Scottish people|Scottish]] [[Botany|botanist]] [[Robert Fortune]] to travel to China under the guise of a Chinese nobleman and obtain Chinese trade secrets and tea plants for replanting. Infiltrating Chinese tea-making facilities, Fortune recorded the Chinese process for creating tea and smuggled tea [[Leaf|leaves]] and [[seed]]s back to the East India Company.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-great-british-tea-heist-9866709/ |last=Rose |first=Sarah|title=The Great British Tea Heist |website=Smithsonian Magazine |access-date=September 30, 2022}}</ref> The East India Company later introduced these methods to [[Company rule in India|company-ruled India]], using India to compete and surpass China in tea production.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/03/10/392116370/tea-tuesdays-the-scottish-spy-who-stole-chinas-tea-empire |title=The Scottish Spy Who Stole China's Tea Empire |website=NPR |access-date=September 30, 2022}}</ref>