Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T19:54:20.811Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Gender and Innovation: Farming, Cooking and Palm Processing in the Ngwa Region, South-Eastern Nigeria, 1900–1930*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 January 2009

Susan Martin
Susan Martin
Affiliation:
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Three main forms of agrarian change are shown to have occurred in the Ngwa region during the period covered in this article. The first was the adoption of a new hand-processing method for palm oil, which can be seen as a response to growing pressures on female labour resources as Ngwa farmers increased their export production of palm oil and kernels. The second was the adoption of cassava by women. This increased their workloads but helped them to fill a hungry-season gap in local food supplies. It formed part of a long-term trend of diversification within Ngwa agriculture. Finally, men began helping with cassava processing. Like their earlier entry into palm-oil processing, this move reflected not only a growing pressure on female labour resources but also a need for men to participate in processing if they were to claim a share of the saleable product. In the concluding sections of the article, gender relations are shown to have influenced farmers' patterns of saving and investment. An awareness of gender is seen to be relevant when considering both the issue of mechanisation and the history of other kinds of agrarian change.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of African History , Volume 25 , Issue 4 , October 1984 , pp. 411 - 427
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See for example Hill, P., The Migrant Cocoa-Farmers of Southern Ghana (Cambridge, 1963)Google Scholar; Berry, S. S., Cocoa, Custom and Socio-Economic Change in Rural Western Nigeria (Oxford, 1975).Google Scholar

2 See for example Hogendorn, J., Nigerian Groundnut Exports: Origins and Early Development (Zaria and Ibadan, 1978)Google Scholar; Swindell, K., ‘Sera Woollies, Tillibunkas and strange farmers: The development of migrant groundnut farming along the Gambia River, 1848–95’, J. Afr. Hist. XXI, 1 (1980), 93–104CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jones, G. I., The Trading States of the Oil Rivers (Oxford, 1963)Google Scholar; Dike, K. O., Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta, 1830–1885 (Oxford, 1956)Google Scholar; Latham, A. J. H., Old Calabar, 1600–1891 (Oxford, 1973)Google Scholar; Northrup, D., Trade Without Rulers: Pre-Colonial Economic Development in South-Eastern Nigeria (Oxford, 1978)Google Scholar; Usoro, E. J., The Nigerian Old Palm Industry (Ibadan, 1974).Google Scholar

3 For a summary of the ‘dependency’ view see Rodney, W., How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (London, 1973)Google Scholar; on ‘vent-for-surplus’ see Myint, H., The Economics of the Developing Countries (4th, revised edn. London, 1973)Google Scholar; for summaries of the historical literature on West Africa see Hopkins, A. G., An Economic History of West Africa (London, 1973)Google Scholar; Hart, K., The Political Economy of West African Agriculture (London, 1982).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 See for example Tosh, John, ‘The cash-crop revolution in tropical Africa: an agricultural reappraisal’, African Affairs, LXXIX (1980), 79–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Levi, J. and Havinden, M., Economics of African Agriculture (Harlow, 1982)Google Scholar; and, for a ‘development planning’ variant of this approach, Ruthenberg, H., Farming Systems in the Tropics (3rd edn. Oxford, 1980).Google Scholar

5 The works criticized here include: Meillassoux, C., Maidens, Meal and Money: Capitalism and the Domestic Community (Cambridge, 1981)Google Scholar; Terray, E., Marxism and ‘Primitive’ Societies (New York, 1972)Google Scholar; Key, P. P., ‘The lineage mode of production’, Critique of Anthropology, III (1975), 27–79.Google Scholar Rey, in his article Rey, in his article ‘Class contradiction in lineage societies’, Critique of Anthropology, XIII-XIV (1979), 41–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar, makes some allowance for gender and discusses the willingness of different social groups to accept innovations. But he does not discuss the possibility of innovations being generated within village society. For criticisms of this group of writers from a feminist perspective see Molyneux, M., ‘Androcentrism in Marxist anthropology’Google Scholar, and Bradby, B., ‘Male rationality in economics – a critique of Godelier on salt money’, Critique of Anthropology, IX–X (1977), 55–81 and 131–138.Google Scholar

6 These traditions have been reproduced in the work of Oriji, J. N., ‘A history of the Ngwa people: social and economic developments in an Igbo clan from the thirteenth to the twentieth centuries’ (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, the State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, 1977).Google Scholar Oriji's main source, apart from his own interviews, was the work of the colonial official, J. G. C. Allen. Allen's three J. G. C. Allen ‘Supplementary intelligence reports, Ngwa clan’ (1933) may be found in the Nigerian National Archives, Ibadan, file CSO 26/29033, vols I and II.

7 Leonard, A. G., ‘Notes of a journey to Bende’, Journal of the Manchester Geographical Society, XIV (1898), 190–207.Google Scholar

8 Much of this material is summarized in Forde, D. and Scott, R., The Native Economies of Nigeria, vol. I of The Economics of a Tropical Dependency, ed. Perham, M. (London, 1946), ch. II.Google Scholar

9 Morgan, W. B., ‘Farming practice, settlement pattern and population density in South-Eastern Nigeria’, Geographical Journal, CXXI, iii (1955), 320–333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Udo, R. K., Geographical Regions of Nigeria (London, 1970), 66–67Google Scholar; Mbagwu, T. C., ‘The oil palm economy in Ngwaland (Eastern Nigeria)’ (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Ibadan, 1970), 25.Google Scholar

11 Oriji, , ‘History of the Ngwa’, 40–48;Google Scholar confirmed by Ngwa farmers interviewed during my own stay in the region, October 1980–February 1981. The following people provided much of the information on which this paper is based: Mrs Nwannedie Chigbundu, aged c. 65, of Ahiaba-Okpuala, interviewed 15 Dec. 1980; Mrs Selina Danne Nwosu, aged c. 65, of Ahiaba-Okpuala, 15 Dec. 1980 and 21 Feb. 1981; A. A. Chigbundu, aged c. 60, of Ahiaba-Okpuala, 19 Dec. 1980; Madam Jemima Nwakwa Nwannunu, aged c. 75, of Umuacha, 21 Dec. 1980; Mrs Sabina Onyema Kanu, aged c. 100, of Umuala, 24 and 28 Dec. 1980; Oji Akpuka, aged c. 75, of Ahiaba-Ubi, 28 Dec. 1980; Josiah Ihediacho, aged c. 80, of Abayi, 4 Jan. 1981; Bob Anyanwu, aged c. 65, of Mbubu-Nsulu, 27 Jan. 1981; Rufus Erondu, aged c. 65, of Umuakwu-Nsulu, 27 Jan. 1981; Thomas Nwadike, aged c, 70, of Ngwama-Ovungwu, 2 Feb. 1981; Augustine Amaeze Nwogu, aged c. 75, of Amiri, 6 Feb. 1981; Achonna Njoku, aged c. 80, of Umuacha, 13 Feb. 1981.

12 Hartley, C. W. S., The Oil Palm (Elaeis guineensis) (2nd edn. London, 1977), 4–7 and 77–78.Google Scholar

13 Harris, D. R., ‘Traditional systems of plant food production and the origins of agriculture in West Africa’, in Harlan, J. R., de Wet, J. M. J. and Stemler, A. B. L., eds., Origins of African Plant Domestication (Paris and The Hague, 1976), 329–333.Google Scholar

14 Latham, , Old Calabar, 5–7Google Scholar; Northrup, , Trade Without Rulers, 217–219.Google Scholar

15 Oriji, , ‘History of the Ngwa’, 40–49.Google Scholar

16 Morgan, W. B., ‘The influence of European contacts on the landscape of Southern Nigeria’, Geographical Journal, CXXV, i (1959), 48–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

17 Northrup, , Trade Without Rulers, 65–69.Google Scholar

18 Oriji, , ‘History of the Ngwa’, 50–87.Google Scholar

19 Northrup, , Trade Without Rulers, 77–78.Google Scholar

20 Ukegbu, B. N., ‘Production in the Nigerian oil palm industry, 1900–1954’ (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of London (external), 1974), 30–34 and 46–55.Google Scholar

21 ibid. 90–118; Udo, R. K., Migrant Tenant Farmers of Nigeria (Lagos, 1975), 20–37Google Scholar; Report of Granville, 10 June 1902, in Morrissey to H.C., 12 June 1902, Ibadan Archives file Calprof 10/3, vol. 111; Summary of Report by Garden in Miller to C.S.G., 14 June 1934, Ibadan Archives file CSO 26/28994.

22 Interviews, 1980–1; Morgan, , ‘Farming practice’, 330Google Scholar; Mbagwu, , ‘Old palm economy’, 105–108.Google Scholar

23 As note 22, and for other Igbo societies Harris, J. S., ‘Papers on the economic aspect of life among the Ozuitem Ibo: 11, Sexual division of labour among the Ozuitem Ibo’, Africa, XIV, ii (1943), 14–19Google Scholar; Basden, G. T., Among the Ibos of Nigeria (London, 1921, reprinted 1966), 82CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Basden, , Niger Ibos (London, 1938, reprinted 1966), 195–196Google Scholar; for a general comment on this pattern, see Brown, J. K., ‘A Note on the Division of Labour by Sex’, American Anthropologist, LXXII (1970), 1073–1078.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24 Falk, E. M., ‘Nigeria papers, 1910–1933’: ‘Notes on the customs and superstitions of the population of the Aba division’ (unpublished MSS, 24 Dec. 1920), Rhodes House, Oxford, MSS.Google Scholar Afr. s. 1000 (1), 31; Morgan, , ‘Farming practice’, 320–323.Google Scholar

25 Interviews, 1980–1; Allen, , ‘First report on the Ngwa’, 1933, CSO 26/29033, vol. 1, PP. 39–40.Google Scholar

26 Interviews, 1980–1; Allen, , ‘First report on the Ngwa’, 25–26Google Scholar; Burrough, H. S., ‘Report on land tenure in Aba District’, 31 Oct. 1912Google Scholar, enclosure in Lugard to Harcourt, 19 Feb. 1913, London Public Record Office file C.O. 520/122.

27 Interviews, 1980–1: this pattern was noted for other Igbo societies by Basden, , Among the Ibos, 53 and 90–93Google Scholar; Meek, C. K., Law and Authority in a Nigerian Tribe (London, 1937, reprinted 1950), 202–203Google Scholar; Green, M. M., Igbo Village Affairs (London, 1947, reprinted 1964), 41–42Google Scholar; Leith-Ross, S., African Women (London, 1939, reprinted 1965), 90 and 143.Google Scholar

28 Interviews, 1980–1; on bridewealth, evidence from petitions in Ngwa divorce cases during the 1930s, contained in the following files in the Nigerian National Archives, Enugu: Abadist 1/26/141, file 180; Abadist 1/7/83, file OW is 64(xiv); Abadist 1/7/351, file OW 2538. For other Igbo societies, Meek, , Law and Authority, 259–266Google Scholar; Green, , Igbo Village Affairs, part IIGoogle Scholar; Harris, , ‘Papers on the economic aspect of life among the Ozuitem Ibo: I., Economic activities of Ozuitem children’, Africa, XIV, i (1943), 12–14CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Basden, , Among the Ibos, 63–66.Google Scholar

29 Interviews, 1980–1; on another Igbo society, Green, , Igbo Village Affairs, part II.Google Scholar This view contrasts with that put forward for the region west of the Niger by Okonjo, Kamene, ‘The dual-sex political system in operation: Igbo women and community politics in Midwestern Nigeria’, in Hafkin, N. J. and Bay, E. G., eds., Women in Africa (Stanford, 1976), 45–58.Google Scholar

30 Interviews, 1980–1; Report by Capt. J. N. Hill, 9 Dec. 1929, and letter, R.O.P. to S.S.P., 31 Dec. 1929, Enugu Archives file Umprof 1/5/1, C 53/1929, vol. I, part I; Notes of Evidence Taken by the Aba Commission, C.O. 583/176/1002/30, pp. 20–1, 28–9, 31 and 59–60; for other Igbo societies see Green, , Igbo Village Affairs, 178–232Google Scholar; Leith-Ross, , African Women, 105–109 and 163–165.Google Scholar

31 Allen, , ‘First report on the Ngwa’, 1933Google Scholar, CSO 26/29033, vol. I, 38 and 76–8.

32 Ukegbu, , ‘Production in the Nigerian oil palm industry’, 30–55Google Scholar; the ‘boiling and squeezing’ method may still be seen in the Ngwa region, and was held to be universal in this region by officials who studied the industry between 1907 and 1913; see Farquhar, J. H. J., The Oil Palm and Its Varieties, ed. and revised by Thompson, H. N. (Crown Agents, 1913), 24–26 and 42Google Scholar; ‘Report on the cultivation of oil palms’, 1908, Enugu Archives, file Calprof 14/3/807, E 2760/8. The two methods described by Ukegbu were also observed by colonial officials in the 1920s; Gray, J. E., ‘Native methods of preparing palm oil’, First Annual Bulletin of the Agricultural Department, Nigeria (Lagos, 1922), 30–32Google Scholar; Faulkner, O. T. and Lewis, C. J., ‘Native Methods of Preparing Palm Oil - II’, Second Ann. Bull. Agric. Dept. Nigeria (Lagos, 1923), 6–10.Google Scholar

33 Interviews, 1980–1.

34 Detailed Liverpool price statistics may be found in a number of official sources, for example the Southern Nigeria Trade Reports, 1906–1909Google Scholar, C.O. 592/3, C.O. 592/5 and C.O. 592/7; and the Empire Marketing Board Publication no. 54, Survey of Vegetable Oilseeds and Oils, vol. I, Oil Palm Products (H.M.S.O. 1932), 114 and 116.Google Scholar For a useful index of these see Usoro, , Nigerian Oil Palm Industry, 21 and 24.Google Scholar The best index of palm-produce prices in Nigeria is contained in Helleiner, G. K., Peasant Agriculture, Government, and Economic Growth in Nigeria (Homewood, Illinois, 1966), 464–468.Google Scholar

35 Annual Report on the Marine Department, Nigeria, 1911Google Scholar, C.O. 592/13, para. 162; ‘Commercial Notes on Aba District, 1912’, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 3/5/104, E 3031/11; interview with Chief J. Isaac Wabara, local historian, of Ohambele, 18 Jan. 1981.

36 Trade Report, 1909Google Scholar, C.O. 592/7, p. 381 Annual Report, Customs Department, Nigeria, 1913Google Scholar, C.O. 657/3, 12 The Nigeria Gazette, 13 Jan. 1916, 25.Google Scholar

37 As notes 34 and 36.

38 ‘Commercial Notes on Aba District, 1912’, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 3/5/104, E 3031/11; Aba Div. Rep., July-Sept. 1914, Rivprof 8/2/552, file OW 773/14; Aba Div. Rep., Jan-Mar. 1916, Rivprof 8/4/181, file OW 236/16 ‘A’.

39 Martin, A., The Oil Palm Economy of the Ibibio Farmer (Ibadan, 1956), 19.Google Scholar

40 Interviews, 1980–1.

41 As note 34; for the railway, see Fig. 1.

42 Customs Department Report, 1921Google Scholar, C.O. 657/6, 8 and 16–17.

43 Owerri Div. Rep., July-Dec. 1919, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 16/1/45A, 8.

44 Lawrence to Watt, 22 June 1921, Rivprof 8/9/545, n'e OW 645/21.

45 ‘Monthly returns of trade in oleaginous produce’, Ibadan Archives, file CSO 26/02130, vol. 11.

46 See note 32, especially Faulkner, and Lewis, , ‘Native Methods…11’, 6–10.Google Scholar

47 Annual Report, Aba Div., 1925, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 8/3/310, file OW 444/1925; Bridges, A. F. B., ‘Report on oil palm survey, Ibo, Ibibio and Cross River areas’, (unpublished MSS, June 1938), Rhodes House, MSSGoogle Scholar Afr. s. 697 (1), appendices II and VII.

48 R.O.P. to S.S.P., 28 Aug. 1926, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 8/12/310, OW 444/1925.

49 Customs Department Report, 1923Google Scholar, C.O. 657/9, 10 ibid. 1929, C.O. 657/24, 11 and 23–32.

50 Interviews, 1980–1; ‘Report on agriculture in the lands adjoining the Eastern Railway, 1917’, Ibadan Archives, file CSO 19/5, N 2037/1917; D.O., Aba to R.O.P., 11 June 1928, and D.O., Bende to R.O.P., 21 June 1928, Enugu Archives, file Rivprof 8/15/390, OW 482/27.

51 Ohadike, D. C., ‘The influenza pandemic of 1918–1919 and the spread of cassava cultivation on the Lower Niger: a study in historical linkages’, J. Afr. Hist, XXIII (1981), 379–391.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

52 Interviews, 1980–1.

53 ‘Report on Agriculture, 1917’, as note 50; Gardner to R.O.P., 29 May 1929, Enugu Archives, Abadist 1/1/2, file C4/1929.

54 Despatches of 1928, as note 50; Harris, J. S., ‘Some aspects of the economics of sixteen Ibo individuals’, Africa, XIV (1944), 322Google Scholar; Jones, W. O., Manioc in Africa (Stanford, 1959). 16–19Google Scholar; Uzozie, L. C., ‘Patterns of crop combination in the three Eastern states of Nigeria’, Journal of Tropical Geography, XXXIII (1971), 62–72.Google Scholar

55 Interviews, 1980–1.

56 Harris, , ‘Economics of sixteen individuals’, 302–303 and 319–325Google Scholar; Ottenberg, P. V., ‘The changing economic position of women among the Afikpo Ibo’, in Bascom, W. R. and Herskovits, M. J., eds., Continuity and Change in African Cultures (Chicago, 1959), 215–217.Google Scholar

57 Interviews, 1980–1.

58 Interviews, 1980–1.

59 Interviews, 1980–1.

60 See, for example, Usoro, , Nigerian Oil Palm Industry, 35–36Google Scholar; Hancock, W. K., A Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs, II, ii (London, 1942), ch. II.Google Scholar

61 These inventions are discussed at length in Martin, , ‘History of the oil palm industry’, ch. 8.Google Scholar

62 Usoro, , Nigerian Oil Palm Industry, chs. 6 and 7.Google Scholar

63 As seen during my stay in the Ngwa area, 1980–1.

64 Mbagwu, , ‘Oil palm economy’, 39–57.Google Scholar

65 Ann. Rep., Aba Div., 1924, Enugu Archives, file Abadist 1/28/14, 22.

66 Ann. Rep., Agricultural Dept., 1928, C.O. 657/22, 11.

67 Interviews, 1980–1; Harris, , ‘Economics of sixteen individuals’, 305–319.Google Scholar

68 Interviews, 1980–1; and the following records held in Enugu Archives: ‘Resident's Court Cases, 1918–27’, Abadist 1/10/15, file 15/18; Aba Supreme Court Civil Judgment Books, 1925–6 and 1928, Abamag 6/1/1 and 6/2/2; Ahiaba Native Court Civil Judgment Book, 1930, Ahiaba N.C. 3/1/1; Civil Cause Books, 1932 and 1932–3, Ahiaba N.C. 5/1/1 and 5/1/2.

69 Interviews, 1980–1.

70 Helleiner, , Peasant Agriculture, 515Google Scholar; Ann. Rep., Aba Div., 1931, Enugu Archives, file Abadist 1/26/148, 195, 13.

71 Interviews, 1980–1.

72 See, for examples of the influence of these theories, Hart, , Political EconomyGoogle Scholar; Davidson, Basil, Modern Africa (London, 1983)Google Scholar; and the debate between Hogendorn, , Freund, and Shenton, in Savanna, V, i (1976), 15–28 and VI, ii (1977), 191–199.Google Scholar For examples of empirical evidence which is difficult to fit within these models see Tosh, , ‘Cash crop revolution’Google Scholar, and Guyer, J., ‘Food, cocoa and the division of labour by sex in two West African societies’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, XXII (1980), 355–373.CrossRefGoogle Scholar