94 COCOA AND CHOCOLATE 



myth, and the " monumental reputation for unhealthi- 

 ness ' undeserved. When De Candolle wrote con- 

 cerning cacao, " I imagine it would succeed on the 

 Guinea Coast,"* as the West African coast is some- 

 times called, he achieved prophecy, but he little 

 dreamed how wonderful this success would be. The 

 rise and growth of the cacao-growing industry in the 

 Gold Coast is one of the most extraordinary develop- 

 ments of the last few decades. In thirty years it has 

 increased its export of cacao from nothing to 40 percent, 

 of the total of the world's production. 



Production of Cacao on the Gold Coast. 



Year. Quantity. Value. 



1891 o tons (80 lbs.) 4 



1896 34 tons 2,276 



1 90 1 980 tons 42*837 



1906 8,975 tons 336,269 



191 1 3>798 tons 1,613,468 



1916 72,161 tons 3,847,720 



1917 90,964 tons 3,146,851 



J 9 l8 66,343 tons 1,796,985 



1919 177,000 tons 8,000,000 



The conditions of production in the Gold Coast 

 present a number of features entirely novel. We hear 

 from time to time of concessions being granted in 

 tropical regions to this or that company of enterprising 

 European capitalists, who employ a few Europeans 

 and send them to the area to manage the industry. The 

 inhabitants of the area become the manual wage earners 

 of the company, and too often in the lust for profits, 

 or as an offering to the god of commercial efficiency, 

 the once easy and free life of the native is lost for ever 

 and a form of wage-slavery takes its place with doubt- 

 ful effects on the life and health of the workers. In 

 defence it is pointed out that yet another portion of 

 the earth has been made productive, which, without 

 the initiative of the European capitalist, must have lain 



*De Candolle, Origin of Cultivated Plants, quoted by R. Whymper. 



