COCOA 187 



Indeed, I believe in some cases the natives have allowed 

 the crop to rot on the trees rather than go to the trouble 

 of collecting it. The farms thus situated are generally 

 receiving less attention, thereby encouraging diseases. 



To alleviate these conditions an extension of the rail- 

 way system is necessary and is being pushed forward. 



Much of the labour now employed on arduous transport 

 work when set free for employment in other channels 

 will have a greater potential value to the colony. 

 Needed reforms in the buying and grading of cocoa can 

 then be more easily introduced, and the cocoa industry 

 generally placed in a more satisfactory condition. 



It might be suggested by the casual observer that the 

 cultivators could co-operate in the matter of providing 

 for themselves light railways for the transport of their 

 produce, but at the present stage of development of the 

 native such a scheme is hardly within the bounds of 

 practical politics. 



The formation of local Cocoa Associations for mutual 

 benefit is at present receiving attention, and when a 

 proper understanding has been created something on a 

 more comprehensive scale may be attempted, and the 

 provision of light local trolly rails, in addition to roads 

 as feeders of the central railway, is worthy of con- 

 sideration. 



The native farmers own their lands, which they have 

 either inherited or bought from other tribes. The bulk 

 of the land appears to have belonged originally to the 

 several tribes, and was vested in the separate " stools " 

 for the use of the tribe as a whole. But the extension of 

 the cultivation of permanent crops would appear to have 

 altered the condition of land tenure, and each family now 

 appears to be possessed of its own lands. 



The area of the cocoa farms planted by individual 

 families is small. A rough estimate of the average 

 annual production of a cocoa farm in the older cocoa- 

 producing districts might put the quantity at about 

 2 tons. Individual owners possess farms yielding as 

 much as 25 tons, but the great majority of the farms are 

 small, and their production does not exceed the former 

 figure. 



The tendency, however, is to extend the areas, as 



