ガ-ナにおける「低開発」とココア農民の形成
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This paper analyses the monoculture cocoa industry in Ghana from the point of view of dependency theory, relating Ghana's underdevelopment to integrated world capitalism.Since Ghana became a British colony in the late 19th century, the export of cocoa has been its economic mainstay, accounting for 50-70% of the country's exports from the early 20th century until the present day. Cocoa production was started in the forested areas of the Gold Coast colonial region, to supercede less profitable cash crops such as palm oil, palm kernel and gum. Production later spread to the Ashanti region. The cocoa monoculture is primarily engaged in by independent peasants, who have shifted away from traditional tribal autosubsistent farming.Ghana is commonly regarded only as the Colony region, colonized before the middle of the 19th century, however the Ashanti and Northern regions are also essential considerations. Furthermore, there were significant differences among the three regions in their dependency upon Great Britain and world capitalism. This paper discusses the socio-economic history of the Asante Kingdom, which ruled the Ashanti region and the Northern region prior to colonialization, and attempts to make clear the level of underdevelopment and the regional gaps which have occurred as a result of a British imperialist free trade colonial policy, and varying Ghanian reactions to this policy.It is commonly assumed that the Asante kingdom developed in conjunction with the slave trade, and therefore that it declined with the interruption of the slave trade in the early 19th century. However, recent anthropological studies indicate that the kingdom was originally based upon the cola trade, with Hausaland as a center of long-distance trade to inland Africa. Asante society was composed essentially of peasant communities engaged in auto-subsistent farming (not autarchy). With the development of cola cash crop production, social stratification within this system was gradually dissolved.From the time of colonization, the three regions were integrated in the cocoa monoculture, and tied into the world capitalist economy. In the Colony region, the native society was compelled to serve the interests of the British colonial society, and they were encouraged to produce cash crops for export to Europe, first palm oil, palm kernel and gum, and later the more profitable cocoa. As a result, their traditional society gradually collapsed, to become one of migrant cocoa farmers or clerical and service workers.In the Asante region, there was a rapid conversion from the production and inland trade of cola nuts in the 19th century, to cocoa production during the 20th century. The Ashanti region has become Ghana's principal source of cocoa as a cash crop for export to Europe. However cocoa production in this area has been carried on primarily by independent peasants, and although some of the local chiefs, who obtained economic surpluses as a result of the cola trade and gold mining, have become large cocoa farmers, the society maintains a low degree of stratification, and the traditional social structure and customs have been largely retained.In the Northern region, production of cash crops is not feasible, and workers from this region either are exploited by mining companies or the colonial government, or migrate to the other two regions as temporary labourers during the cocoa harvesting season. As a result, the Northern region has gradually been accepted as a labour reservoir.The Ghanaian cocoa monoculture grew up with British imperialist free trade policy as its basis. British cocoa purchasing firms have succeeded in their goal of oligopolisation by not only lowering cocoa prices, but also impelling cocoa farmers to buy British consumer goods.
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