Asiatic and European invaders the Africans indeed owed many
creature comforts—the introduction of maize, rice, the sugar
cane, the orange, the lemon and the lime, cloves, tobacco and
many other vegetable products, the camel, the horse and other
animals—but invaluable to Africa as were these gifts they led
to little development of commerce. The continent continued
in virtual isolation from the great trade movements of the
Causes of isolation. world, an isolation due not so much to its poverty in
natural resources, as to the special circumstances which
likewise caused so large a part of the continent to
remain so long a terra incognita. The principal drawbacks may
be summarized as: (1) the absence of means of communication
with the interior; (2) the unhealthiness of the coast-lands; (3)
the small productive activity of the natives; (4) the effects of the
slave trade in discouraging legitimate commerce. None of these
causes is necessarily permanent, that most difficult to remove
being the third; the negro races finding the means of existence
easy have little incentive to toil. The first drawback has almost
disappeared, and the building of railways and the placing of
steamers on the rivers and lakes—a work continually progressing—renders
it year by year easier for producer and consumer to
come together. As to the second drawback, while the coast-lands
in the tropics will always remain comparatively unhealthy,
improved sanitation and the destruction of the malarial mosquito
have rendered tolerable to Europeans regions formerly notorious
for their deadly climate.
At various periods since the partition of the continent began, united action has been taken by the powers of Europe in the interests of African trade. The Berlin conference of 1884–1885 decreed freedom of navigation and trade on the Congo and the Niger, and the Anglo-Portuguese treaty of 1891 secured like privileges for the Zambezi. The Berlin conference likewise enacted that over a wide area of Central Africa—the conventional basin of the Congo—there should be complete freedom of trade, a freedom which later on was held to be infringed in the Congo State and French Congo by the granting to various companies proprietary rights in the disposal of the product of the soil. More important in their effect on the economic condition of the continent than the steps taken to ensure freedom of trade were the measures concerted by the powers for the suppression of the slave trade. The British government had for long borne the greater part of the burden of combating the slave trade on the east coast of Africa and in the Indian Ocean, but the changed conditions which resulted from the appearance of other European powers in Africa induced Lord Salisbury, then foreign secretary, to address, in the autumn of 1888, an invitation to the king of the Belgians to take the initiative in inviting a conference of the powers at Brussels to concert measures for “the gradual suppression of the Suppression of the slave trade. slave trade on the continent of Africa, and the immediate closing of all the external markets which it still supplies.” The conference assembled in November 1889, and on the 2nd of July 1890 a general act was signed subject to the ratification of the various governments represented, ratification taking place subsequently at different dates, and in the case of France with certain reservations. The general act began with a declaration of the means which the powers were of opinion might be most effectually adopted for “putting an end to the crimes and devastations engendered by the traffic in African slaves, protecting effectively the aboriginal populations of Africa, and ensuring for that vast continent the benefits of peace and civilization.” It proceeded to lay down certain rules and regulations of a practical character on the lines suggested. The act covers a wide field, and includes no fewer than a hundred separate articles. It established a zone “between the 20th parallel of north latitude, and the 22nd parallel of south latitude, and extending westward to the Atlantic and eastward to the Indian Ocean and its dependencies, comprising the islands adjacent to the coast as far as 100 nautical miles from the shore,” within which the importation of firearms and ammunition was forbidden except in certain specified cases, and within which also the powers undertook either to prohibit altogether the importation and manufacture of spirituous liquors, or to impose duties not below an agreed-on minimum.[1] An elaborate series of rules was framed for the prevention of the transit of slaves by sea, the conditions on which European powers were to grant to natives the right to fly the flag of the protecting power, and regulating the procedure connected with the right of search on vessels flying a foreign flag. The Brussels Act was in effect a joint declaration by the signatory powers of their joint and several responsibility towards the African native, and notwithstanding the fact that many of its articles have proved difficult, if not impossible, of enforcement, the solemn engagement taken by Europe in the face of the world has undoubtedly exercised a material influence on the action of several of the powers. Moreover, with the increase of means of communication and the extension of effective European control, slave-raiding in the interior was largely checked and inter-tribal wars prevented, the natives being thus given security in the pursuit of trade and agriculture.
Other important factors in the economic as well as the social conditions of Africa are the advance in civilization made by the natives in several regions and the increase of the areas found suitable for white colonization. The advance in civilization among the natives, exemplified by the granting to them of political rights in such countries as Algeria and Cape Colony, leads directly to increased commercial activity; and commerce increases in a much greater degree when new countries—e.g. Rhodesia and British East Africa—become the homes of Europeans. Finally, in reviewing the chief factors which govern the commercial development of the continent, note must be taken of the sparsity of the population over the greater part of Africa, and the efforts made to supplement the insufficient and often ineffective native labour by the introduction of Asiatic labourers in various districts—of Indian coolies in Natal and elsewhere, and of Chinese for the gold mines of the Transvaal.
The resources of Africa may be considered under the head of: (1) jungle products; (2) cultivated products; (3) animal products; (4) minerals. Of the first named the most important are india-rubber and palm-oil. which in tropical Africa supply by far the largest items in the export list. The rubber-producing plants are found Chief economic resources.throughout the whole tropical belt, and the most important are creepers of the order Apocynaceae, especially various species of Landolphia (with which genus Vahea is now united). In East Africa Landolphia kirkii (Dyer) supplies the largest amount, though various other species are known. Forms of apparently wider distribution are L. hendelotii, which is found in the Bahr-el-Ghazal, and extends right across the continent to Senegambia; and L. (formerly Vahea) comorensis, which, including its variety L. florida, has the widest distribution of all the species, occurring in Upper and Lower Guinea, the whole of Central Africa, the east coast, the Comoro Islands and Madagascar. In parts of East Africa Clitandra orientalis is a valuable rubber vine. In Lagos and elsewhere rubber is produced by the apocynaceous tree, Funtumia elastica, and in West Africa generally by various species of Ficus, some species of which are also found in East Africa. The rubber produced is somewhat inferior to that of South America, but this is largely due to careless methods of preparation. The great destruction of vines brought about by native methods of collection much reduced the supply in some districts, and rendered it necessary to take steps to preserve and cultivate the rubber-yielding plants. This has been done in many districts with usually encouraging results. Experiments have been made in the introduction of South American rubber plants, but opinions differ as to the prospects of success, as the plants in question seem to demand very definite conditions of soil and climate. The second product, palm-oil, is derived from a much more limited area than rubber, for although the oil palm is found throughout the greater part of West Africa, from 10° N. to 10° S., the great bulk of the export comes from the coast districts at the head of the Gulf of Guinea. A larger supply,
- ↑ Further conferences respecting the liquor traffic in Africa were held in Brussels in 1899 and 1906. In both instances conventions were signed by the powers, raising the minimum duty on imported spirituous liquors.
