The board was first established as a temporary committee of England's Privy Council to advise on colonial (plantation) questions in the early 17th century, when these settlements were initially forming.

The board would evolve gradually into a government department with considerable power and a diverse range of functions,[2] including regulation of domestic and foreign commerce, the development, implementation and interpretation of the Acts of Trade and Navigation, and the review and acceptance of legislation passed in the colonies.

Between 1696 and 1782 the Board of Trade, in partnership with the various secretaries of state over that time,[a] held responsibility for colonial affairs, particularly in British America.

The new board's first functions were consultative like earlier iterations, and its concern with plantations, in matters such as the approval of colonial laws, more successfully accomplished.

From the 1840s, a succession of acts of parliament gave it regulatory duties, notably concerning railways, merchant shipping and joint-stock companies.

In 1622, at the end of the Dutch Twelve Years' Truce, King James I directed the Privy Council of England to establish a temporary committee to investigate the causes of various economic and supply problems, the decline in trade and consequent financial difficulties; detailed instructions and questions were given, with answers to be given "as fast as the several points shall be duly considered by you.

[9] The board's formal title remains "The Lords of the Committee of the Privy Council appointed for the consideration of all matters relating to Trade and Foreign Plantations".

[10] It was headed by the Archbishop of Canterbury with its primary goals to increase royal authority and the influence of the Church of England in the colonies, particularly with the great influx of Puritans to the New World.

Soon after, the English Civil Wars erupted and initiated a long period of political instability in England and the resultant loss of productivity for these committees.

[2] The war would spread to varying degrees to the English colonies, depending on the internal demographics and political and religious division of each.

[9] This period also saw the first regulation of royal tonnage and poundage and begin the modernization of customs and excise as growing sources of government revenue.

They represent the first attempt to establish a legitimate control of commercial and colonial affairs, and the instructions indicate the beginnings of a policy which had the prosperity and wealth of England exclusively at heart.

The board carried on this work but also had long periods of inactivity, devolving into chaos after 1761 and dissolved in 1782 by an act of Parliament by the Rockingham Whigs.

William Pitt the Younger re-established the committee in 1784, and an Order in Council of 23 August 1786 provided the formal basis that still remains in force.

During the second half of the 19th century it also dealt with legislation for patents, designs and trademarks, company regulation, labour and factories, merchant shipping, agriculture, transport, power etc.

In 1905, David Lloyd George entered the new Liberal Cabinet of Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman as President of the Board of Trade.

[19] According to Martin Roberts, Lloyd George headed a department of 750 experts that was responsible for supervising British industry, commerce and transportation.

[20] One of the first actions was the Census of Production Act 1906, which generated a Survey of production—an up-to-date compendium of detailed statistics necessary for regulating specific industries.

It merged numerous inefficient and overlapping private companies and gave unified supervision to Britain's most important port.