19世纪末,西方殖民列强为了争夺在中国的殖民势力范围和资源及商品市场,纷纷向中国派出各类考察团。1895—1897年间,法国里昂商会对中国西南边疆诸省、长江及珠江西江流域进行了商务考察,其中1896年10月至1897年6月在广西的考察包括商道、民风民情、城镇集市、乡野物产等。对其考察历史的追述,将为丰富中国南疆历史和边疆学的研究提供参考。
At the end of the 19th century,western powers dispatched all kinds of groups one after another to China,in order to gain more colonial sphere and resources as well as commodity market in China. From 1895 to 1897,Lyon Trade Union of France conducted a series of commercial investigation in southwest Chinese frontier provinces,the drainage basins of the Yangtze River,the Pearl River and the Xijiang River. Among which the investigation in Guangxi from October 1896 to June 1897 covered commercial road,folkway,town marketplace and countryside products and so on. The research is helpful for the study of the south China history and of the borderland study.