1. The Consequences of Colonialism The Impact on Land and Land Use

2. Ethnic Composition Large parts of Africa were wrecked and depopulated by slavery. The Slaves moved to the Caribbean and South America. (Corn moved to Africa to feed them.) There were other large movements of people: European Settlers, Indentured labor (Indians in East Africa, in the Fiji Islands), Depopulation (Caribbean and Latin America).

3. The Commoditization of Agriculture Because of taxes, or the law, people had to grow new crops that were entirely for export. At the same time, they had to grow their own food too, so they were between two worlds. Very little of the value of this extra labor went to the grower. In some places, farmers became laborers.

4. Indoctrination of New Values The old ideas were discredited as “tradition,” folklore, primitive etc. The local people associated the new ideas with a stronger, superior culture, and so they lost their traditions, their religions and their identity.

5. Neglect of Food Crops Unless the local food crops had some commercial value, which was not often, then all the attention of the Europeans went into commercial crops. These were mainly luxuries with almost no food value, such as tea, coffee, vanilla, cotton, peanuts, cocoa, rubber and tropical oils. This neglect of subsistence crops, particularly in Africa, was going to create huge problems later.

6. The Nature of Trade Tropical exports mostly unprocessed natural products. Imports mostly high-value manufactured goods and services, as well as entertainment and fuel. “Terms of Trade” have worked against the Tropics in general. Much of “Development” has a large import component.

7. The Low Profile of Agriculture Agricultural exports were the cash cow of poor-country governments The benefits of this trade flowed back mostly into the elites and the cities, leaving agriculture under-capitalized, without incentives, and neglected. This encouraged a flood of people from the land into the cities, where there was no work

8. The Divided World The process of the Colonial economy, over such a long period of time, built up huge advantages for the European countries. This created the “Rich” and “Poor” world. These advantages tend to perpetuate themselves structurally and institutionally.