B. to ensure better trading profits
Explanation:
With the end of the Napoleonic Wars, all maritime trade turned to the East, but there was a problem: China still had some restrictions on trade with foreign countries.
Britain, which in turn was undergoing the second Industrial Revolution, increasingly needed low-priced raw materials and a large consumer market to sell its products. And that is where China and India arouse great interest from the British as they both had a large population, which would mean a large consumer market. India was open to any foreign business, and on the contrary, China was very resilient, at least when it came to buying European products, but selling its products to these interested countries, she did not think twice.
China was a major producer of silk, porcelain and tea, which was the product of most interest in the British. In 1720 they bought about 12,700 tons of tea from the Chinese, and in 1830 they bought about 360,000 tons, but the Chinese had no interest in European products, which made the British very small profits. Only one product aroused great interest in them and often it was he who made trade with China profitable. That product was Opium.
Opium is a numbing substance extracted from poppy, and causes chemical dependence on its users. It was transported illegally from England to China, and there often the British forced the Chinese to consume it, which caused dependence and thus made large profits and increased the volume of trade.
