Trees, tenure and conflict: Rubber in colonial Benin

Fenske, James (2012): Trees, tenure and conflict: Rubber in colonial Benin.

Abstract

Tree crops have changed land tenure in Africa. Farmers have acquired more permanent, alienable rights, but have also faced disputes with competing claimants and the state. I show that the introduction of Para rubber had similar effects in the Benin region of colonial Nigeria. Farmers initially obtained land by traditional methods. Mature farms were assets that could be sold, let out, and used to raise credit. Disputes over rubber involved smallholders, communities of rival users, would-be migrant farmers and commercial plantations.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Africa, rubber, land tenure, Benin, Nigeria, tree crops, land disputes
• Subjects: N - Economic History > N5 - Agriculture, Natural Resources, Environment, and Extractive Industries > N57 - Africa ; Oceania; O - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth > O1 - Economic Development > O10 - General

References

Acemoglu, D. and Johnson, S. (2005). Unbundling institutions. Journal of Political Economy, 113(5).

Acemoglu, D., Johnson, S., and Robinson, J. (2001). The colonial origins of comparative development: An empirical investigation. American Economic Review, 91(5):1369– 1401.

Agwu, A. (2006). Enhancing natural rubber (Hevea brasiliensis) production through extension service delivery in south west agricultural zone of Nigeria. Agro-Science, 5(2):7–17.

Amanor, K. (1999). Global restructuring and land rights in Ghana: forest food chains, timber, and rural livelihoods. Nordic Africa Institute.

Amanor, K. S. (2010). Family values, land sales and agricultural commodification in south-eastern Ghana. Africa, 80(1):104–125.

Amobi, C. C., Ndubizu, T. O. C., Oyebanji, O. O., Onuwaje, O. U., Otoide, V. O., and Alika, J. E. (1983). Report on decline of natural rubber production in Nigeria – causes and recommendations. Technical report, Rubber Research Institute of Nigeria.

Andr´e, C. and Platteau, J. (1998). Land relations under unbearable stress: Rwanda caught in the Malthusian trap. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 34(1):1–47.

Anschel, K. (1965). Economic aspects of peasant rubber production in Midwestern Nigeria. PhD thesis,Michigan State University.

Anschel, K. R. (1967). Proplems and prospects of the Nigerian rubber industry. Nigerian journal of economic and social studies, 9(2):145–159.

Austin, G. (1986). The emergence of capitalist relations in South Asante cocoa-farming c. 1916-1933. The journal of African history, 28(2):259–279.

Banerjee, A. and Iyer, L. (2005). History, institutions, and economic performance: the legacy of colonial land tenure systems in India. The American economic review, 95(4):1190–1213.

Bauer, P. (1946). The working of rubber regulation. The Economic Journal, pages 391– 414.

Berry, S. (1975). Cocoa, custom and socio-economic change in rural Western Nigeria. Oxford.

Berry, S. (1988). Property rights and rural resource management: The case of tree crops in West Africa. Cahier des sciences humaines, 24(1):3–16.

Berry, S. (1989). Social institutions and access to resources. Africa, 59(1):41–55.

Besley, T. (1995). Property rights and investment incentives: Theory and evidence from Ghana. Journal of Political Economy, 103(5):903–37.

Blanckenburg, P. (1965). Rubber farming in Benin area, a study of some socio-economic factors influencing rubber production. Preliminary Report.

Bradbury, R. (1957). The Benin Kingdom and the Edo-speaking peoples of south-western Nigeria. International African Institute.

Bradbury, R. E. (1973). Benin studies. Oxford University Press.

Chauveau, J. and Colin, J. (2010). Customary transfers and land sales in Cˆote d’Ivoire: revisiting the embeddedness issue. Africa, 80(1):81–103.

Chimhowu, A., Woodhouse, P., and Studies, A. (2010). Forbidden but not suppressed: a ‘vernacular’ land market in Svosve Communal Lands, Zimbabwe. Africa: The Journal of the International African Institute, 80(1):14–35.

Christy, C. (1911). The African rubber industry and Funtumia elastica (“kickxia”). J. Bale, Sons & Danielson, Limited.

Colin, J. P. and Woodhouse, P. (2010). Introduction: interpreting land markets in Africa. Africa, 80(1):1–13.

Dell, M. (2010). The Persistent Effects of Peru’s Mining Mita. Econometrica (forthcoming).

Egharevba, J. U. (1936). A short history of Benin. ChurchMissionary Society Bookshop.

Egharevba, J. U. (1949). Benin law and custom. Niger Press.

Fenske, J. (2010). “Rubber will not keep in this country”: Failed development in Benin, 1897-1921. Working paper.

Field, E. (2007). Entitled to Work: Urban Property Rights and Labor Supply in Peru. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 122(4):1561–1602.

Goldstein, M. and Udry, C. (2008). The profits of power: Land rights and agricultural investment in Ghana. Journal of Political Economy, 116(6).

Greif, A. (2006). Institutions and the path to the modern economy: Lessons from medieval trade. Cambridge University Press.

Guyer, J. (1984). Family and farm in southern Cameroon. Boston University.

Hill, P. (1997). The migrant cocoa-farmers of southern Ghana: A study in rural capitalism. Lit Verlag.

Holden, S. T.,Otsuka, K., and Place, F. M. (2009). The emergence of land markets in Africa: assessing the impacts on poverty, equity, and efficiency. Washington, DC, resources for the future edition.

Igbafe, P. A. (1979). Benin under British administration: the impact of colonial rule on an African kingdom, 1897-1938. Humanities Press, Atlantic Highlands, NJ.

Kobben, A. (1963). Land as an Object of Gain in a Non-literate Society. Land-tenure among the Bete and Dida (Ivory Coast,West Africa). In Biebuyck, D. P., editor, African agrarian systems: studies presented and discussed at the second international African seminar, Lovanium University, Leopoldville, January 1960, pages 245–266. Published

Libecap, G. (2007). The assignment of property rights on the western frontier: lessons for contemporary environmental and resource policy. The Journal of Economic History, 67(02):257–291.

Lugard, F. D. (c. 1914). Tour in the Southern Provinces. Rhodes’ House Library.

Meek, C. (1957). Land tenure and land administration in Nigeria and the Cameroons.HerMajesty’s Stationery Office, London.

Mesike, C., Owie, O., and Okoh, R. (2009). Resource-Use Efficiency and Return to Scale in Smallholders Rubber Farming System in Edo State,Nigeria. Journal ofHuman Ecology, 28(3):183–186.

North, D. and Thomas, R. (1973). The rise of the western world: A new economic history. Cambridge University Press.

Oluwasanmi, H. A. (1966). Agriculture and Nigerian economic development. Oxford University Press.

Osadolor, O. (2001). The military system of Benin Kingdom, c. 1440-1897. Staats-und Universit ”atsbibliothek Carl von Ossietzky.

Osagie, J. I. (1988). The Development of Agriculture in Esan, 1900-1960. PhD thesis, University of Benin.

Osemeobo, G. (1987). Smallholder farmers and forestry development: A study of rural land use in Bendel, Nigeria. Agricultural Systems, 24(1):31–51.

Quisumbing, A. R., Payongayong, E., Aidoo, J. B., and Otsuka, K. (2001). Womens land rights in the transition to individualized ownership: Implications for tree-resource management in western Ghana. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 50:157–181.

Robertson, A. (1982). Abusa: The structural history of an economic contract. Journal of Development Studies, 18(4):447–478.

Rowling, C. W. (1948). Notes on Land Tenure in the Benin, Kukuruku, Ishan and Asaba Divisions of Benin Province. Lagos: Government Printers.

Ryder, A. F. C. (1969). Benin and the Europeans, 1485-1897. Humanities Press.

Sitko, N. J. (2010). Fractured governance and local frictions: the exclusionary nature of a clandestine land market in southern Zambia. Africa, 80(1):36–55.

Udo, R. K. (1965). Sixty years of plantation agriculture in Southern Nigeria: 1902-1962. Economic Geography, 41(4):356–368.

Udo, R. K. (1975). Migrant Tenant Farmers of Nigeria. African Universities Press, Lagos.

Unruh, J.D. (2009). Land rights in postwar Liberia: the volatile part of the peace process. Land Use Policy, 26(2):425–433.

Upton, M. (1967). Agriculture in south western Nigeria. University of Reading.

Usuanlele, U. (1988). State and Class in Benin Division 1897–1959: A History of Colonial Domination and Class Formation. PhD thesis, Ahmadu Bello University.

Usuanlele, U. (2003). Colonialism and the Environment: the Deforestation of the Rainforest of Benin and Ishan Divisions, 1897–1960. PhD thesis, Ahmadu Bello University.

von Hellermann, P. and Usuanlele, U. (2009). The owner of the land: The Benin Obas and colonial forest reservation in the Benin Division, Southern Nigeria. The Journal of African History, 50(02):223–246.

Ward-Price, H. L. (1939). Land tenure in the Yoruba provinces. Printed by the government printer, Lagos.