equal to any market demand, could easily be obtained. A third
valuable product is the timber supplied by the forest regions,
principally in West Africa. It includes African teak or oak
(Oldfieldia africana), excellent for shipbuilding; the durable
odum of the Gold Coast (Chlorophora excelsa); African mahogany
(Khaya senegalensis); ebony (Diospyros ebenum); camwood
(Baphia nitida); and many other ornamental and dye woods.
The timber industry on the west coast was long neglected, but
since 1898 there have been large exports to Europe. In parts of
East Africa the Podocarpus milanjianus, a conifer, is economically
important. Valuable timber grows too in South Africa, including
the yellow wood (Podocarpus), stinkwood (Ocotea), sneezewood or
Cape ebony (Euclea) and ironwood.
Other vegetable products of importance are: Gum arabic, obtained from various species of acacia (especially A. senegal), the chief supplies of which are obtained from Senegambia and the steppe regions of North Africa (Kordofan, &c.); gum copal, a valuable resin produced by trees of the leguminous order, the best, known as Zanzibar or Mozambique copal, coming from the East African Trachylobium hornemannianum, and also found in a fossil state under the soil; kola nuts, produced chiefly in the coast-lands of Upper Guinea by a tree of the order Sterculiaceae (Kola acuminata); archil or orchilla, a dye-yielding lichen (Rocella tinctoria and triciformis) growing on trees and rocks in East Africa, the Congo basin, &c.; cork, the bark of the cork oak, which flourishes in Algeria; and alfa, a grass used in paper manufacture (Machrochloa tenacissima), growing in great abundance on the dry steppes of Algeria, Tripoli, &c. A product to which attention has been paid in Angola is the Almeidina gum or resin, derived from the juice of Euphorbia tirucalli.
The cultivated products include those of the tropical and warm temperate zones. Of the former, coffee is perhaps the most valuable indigenous plant. It grows wild in many parts, the home of one species being in Kaffa and other Galla countries south of Abyssinia, and of another in Liberia. The Abyssinian coffee is equal to the best produced in any other part of the world. Cultivation is, however, necessary to ensure the best results, and attention has been given to this in various European colonies. Plantations have been established in Angola, Nyasaland, German East Africa, Cameroon, the Congo Free State, &c.
Copra, the produce of the cocoa-nut palm, is supplied chiefly by Zanzibar and neighbouring parts of the east coast. Groundnuts, produced by the leguminous plant, Arachis hypogaea, are grown chiefly in West Africa, and the largest export is from Senegal and the Gambia; while Bambarra ground-nuts (Voandzeia subterranea) are very generally cultivated from Guinea to Natal. Cloves are extensively grown on Zanzibar and Pemba islands, Pemba being the chief source of the world’s supply of cloves. The chief drawbacks to the industry are the fluctuations of the yield of the trees, and the risk of over-production in good seasons.
Cotton grows wild in many parts of tropical Africa, and is exported in small quantities in the raw state; but the main export is from Egypt, which comes third among the world’s sources of supply of the article. It is also cultivated in West Africa—the industry in the Guinea coast colonies having been developed since the beginning of the 20th century—and in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, whence came the plants from which Egyptian cotton is grown. Sugar, which is the staple crop of Mauritius, and in a lesser degree of Reunion, is also produced in Natal, Egypt, and, to a certain extent, in Mozambique. Dates are grown in Tunisia and the Saharan oases, especially Tafilet; maize in Egypt, South Africa and parts of the tropical zone; wheat in Egypt, Algeria and the higher regions of Abyssinia; rice in Madagascar. Wine is largely exported from Algeria, and in a much smaller quantity from Cape Colony; fruit and vegetables from Algeria. Tobacco is widely grown on a small scale, but, except perhaps from Algeria, has not become an important article of export, though plantations have been established in various tropical colonies. The cultivation of cocoa has proved successful in the Gold Coast, Cameroon and other colonies, and in various districts the tea plant is cultivated. Indigo, though not originally an African product, has become naturalized and grows wild in many parts, while it is also cultivated on a small scale. The main difficulty in the way of tropical cultivation is the labour question, which has already been referred to.
Of animal products one of the most important is ivory, the largest export of which is from the Congo Free State. The diminution in the number of elephants with the opening up of the remoter districts must in time cause a falling-off in this export. Beeswax is obtained from various parts of the interior of West Africa, and from Madagascar. Raw hides are exported in large quantities from South Africa, as are also the wool and hair of the merino sheep and Angora goat. Both hides and wool are also exported from Algeria and Morocco, and hides from Abyssinia and Somaliland. Ostrich feathers are produced chiefly by the ostrich farms of Cape Colony, but some are also obtained from the steppes to the north of the Central Sudan. Live stock, principally sheep, is exported from Algeria and cattle from Morocco.
The exploited minerals of Africa are confined to a few districts, the resources of the continent in this respect being largely undeveloped. Since the discovery of gold in the Transvaal, particularly in the district known as the Rand (1885), the output has grown enormously, so that in 1898 the output of gold from South Africa was greaterMineral Wealth. than from any other gold-field in the world. The Anglo-Boer War of 1899–1902 lost the Rand the leading position, but by 1905 the output—in that year over £20,800,000—was greater than it had ever been. The supply of gold from South Africa is roughly 25% of the world’s output. The gold-yielding formations extend northwards through Rhodesia. The Gold Coast is so named from the quantity of gold obtained there, and since the close of the 19th century the industry has developed largely in the hands of Europeans. In the Galla countries gold has long been an article of native commerce. It is also found in various parts of the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan and along the western shore of the Red Sea. Diamonds are found in large quantities in a series of beds known as the Kimberley shales, the principal mines being at Kimberley, Cape Colony. Diamonds are also found in Orange River Colony, while one of the richest diamond mines in the world—the Premier—is situated in the Transvaal near Pretoria. Some 80% of the world’s production of diamonds comes from South Africa. Copper is found in the west of Cape Colony, in German South-West Africa, and in the Katanga country in the southern Congo basin, where vast beds of copper ore exist. There are also extensive deposits of copper in the Broken Hill district of Northern Rhodesia. It also occurs in Morocco, Algeria, the Bahr-el-Ghazal, &c. Rich tin deposits have been found in the southern Congo basin and in Northern Rhodesia. Iron is found in Morocco, Algeria (whence there is an export trade), and is widely diffused, and worked by the natives, in the tropical zone. But the deposits are generally not rich. Coal is worked, principally for home consumption, in Cape Colony, Natal, the Transvaal, Orange River Colony, and in Rhodesia in the neighbourhood of the Zambezi. Coal deposits also exist in the German territory north of Lake Nyasa. Phosphates are exported from Algeria and Tunisia. Of other minerals which occur, but are little worked, zinc, lead and antimony are found in Algeria, lead and manganese in Cape Colony, plumbago in Sierra Leone.
The imports from foreign countries into Africa consist chiefly of manufactured goods, varying in character according to the development of the different countries in civilization. In Egypt, Algeria and South Africa they include most of the necessaries and luxuries of civilized life, manufactured cotton and woollen goods, especially the former, taking the first place, but various food stuffs, metal goods, coal and miscellaneous articles being also included. In tropical Africa, and generally where few Europeans have settled, the great bulk of the imports consists as a rule of cotton goods, articles for which there is a constant native demand.
No continent has in the past been so lacking in means of
