Palm Oil and Protest

The Ngwa region lies in the heart of the Nigerian palm belt. Palm oil is one of the oldest foodstuffs of the region and has also been an export crop, produced mainly by women, from the early nineteenth century to the present day. This book describes the rise and fall of the oil palm export industry. In contrast to the views of both dependency and vent-for-surplus theorists, it is shown that patterns of export growth and capital investment were heavily influenced by locally inspired changes in food production methods, gender and intergenerational relationships. The processes of change within the domestic and export economies became increasingly closely intertwined after 1924, when African coastal middlemen began to settle further inland and to spread the knowledge of cassava and Christianity, and when colonial officials introduced direct taxation and consolidated their Native Court system. Ngwa women and their neighbours protested vigorously against government interference through the Igbo Women's War of 1929, but failed to reverse the trend. Since then, falling world market prices for palm produce and the introduction of Marketing Board levies have caused a steady decline in the incomes of both female and male palm producers. Many young men began to seek their fortunes outside the villages, while the women who remained turned to cassava as a new staple food and cash crop. This book draws upon a wide range of economic, botanical, anthropological and historical studies as well as on colonial archives, but its heart lies in the oral evidence and life histories generously provided by Ngwa men and women.