India's population growth rate under the Mughal Empire (16th–18th centuries) was higher than during any previous period in Indian history. Under the Mughal Empire, India experienced an unprecedented economic and demographic upsurge, due to Mughal agrarian reforms that intensified agricultural production, proto-industrialization that established India as the most important centre of manufacturing in international trade, and a relatively high degree of urbanisation for its time; 15% of the population lived in urban centres, higher than the percentage of the population in 19th-century British India and contemporary Europe up until the 19th century.