West Africa was particularly noted for its indigenous economic development. As Elliott Skinner (1964) put it: "The peoples of [precolonial West Africa] had economies which made agricultural produce available in amounts large enough to be sold in rural and urban markets; craft specialization often organized along the line of craft guilds, whose members manufactured goods to be sold in these markets; different kinds of currencies which were nearly always convertible one to another and, later, to European denominations of values; and elaborate trading systems, external as well as internal. Goods produced in even the smallest West African societies were circulated in local market centres, and ultimately by porters, caravans, and boats, to the large Sudanese emporiums from which they could be shipped to Mediterranean areas in exchange for foreign products" (205).

Africans engaged in a wide variety of economic activities. Although mostly primary - agricultural, pastoralism, hunting, fishing, and woodworking - there were also crafts and other industries such as clothweaving, pottery, brass works, and the mining and smelting of iron, gold, silver, copper, and tin.

Agriculture was the primary occupation of Africans, and the basic unit of production was the extended family. Each family constituted itself into a working unit or labor force and acted as an operative economic entity that produced goods and distributed the fruits of labor as its members saw fit, allowing for individual discretion and reward. Within the family, there was specialization of labor and sexual division of occupation. Different crops were raised by different members and certain tasks were reserved for women. For example, the cultivation of food crops (domestic staples) was almost everywhere a female occupation. The majority of Africa's peasant farmers today are women. In Ethiopia, however, women raised goats in addition to farming.

What a person grew on the land was his own free decision to make. The produce was private property. Even among the Kalahari Bushmen, "all that a woman gathered belonged to her alone, and of course was shared with her family" (Marshall, 1973, 113). How much a person shared with his kinsmen and how much he kept for himself was an individual decision to make. There were rarely mandated, proportional distribution of produce among the extended family. As M. J. Field (1940, 62) observed of the Ga people of Ghana, "in farming every married man has his own farm though all help each in clearing, so problems of division of produce do not arise."

In much of indigenous Africa, all the means of production were owned by the natives, not by their rulers, the chiefs, or by tribal governments. Feudalism was not commonplace in Africa, except in Abyssinia (Ethiopia). That means, in popular language, that all the means of production were privately owned. The hunting spears, fishing nets, cattle, pots, huts, farm produce, fish, textile looms, gold jewelery shops, and various tools and products were all privately owned. As Robert F. Gray (1962) observed of the Sonjo of Kenya: Generally speaking, property is privately owned among the Sonjo. The only important exception is the building plots upon which houses are built. These are owned communally. The other forms of property are owned by individuals. Thus, a piece of property such as a field, a beehive, or a goat, at any given time can be traced in ownership to an individual. According to Sonjo law, a man has ultimate ownership rights in his own property and in all property possessed by his patrilineal descendants for as long as he lives. When he dies, these rights are inherited by his heirs. (45-46)

Ownership of land, however, was an issue over which there was a great deal of confusion among development experts. In the early days, unoccupied land belonged to no one. Anyone could use natural waters and pastures. But as soon as a man sunk a well or built a dam, he could exercise exclusive rights over the water it contained (Schapera, 1953). "The man who first came with his followers to settle in a previously unoccupied area was usually termed the 'owner of the land' and his heir would continue to receive respect for his primacy" (Colson, 1953). Among the Tonga, who occupy the plateau of southern Zambia, the owner was called ulanyika and tendaana among the Dagaaba on northern Ghana.

On the inherited land, family members exercised only usufructural rights. A son had the right of use but could not sell the land. Ownership and control remained within the lineage. Lineage control over the land was exercised by the elders and in some small tribes by the chief. Communal ownership is really a misleading description of this system for it implies open access by all in the village to any piece of land, which was certainly not the case. Clearly, if what obtained was communal tenure, then shifting cultivation would be possible only when the whole community moved to another location. As Bohannan and Bohannan (1968) contend, "Communal tenure is an illusion that results from viewing the systematic exploitation by kinship groups of their environment through the distorting lens of western market-oriented and contract-dominated institutions of property and ownership" (88). The more accurate description is family or lineage ownership. All those who trace their ancestry to a certain individual are entitled to use his original plot of land. The individual farmer would make his own determination what to cultivate on that land.

Africans engaged in a variety of industrial activities in the precolonial era. In Benin, "the glass industry made extraordinary strides" (Diop, 1987, 136). In Nigeria, "the cloth industry was an ancient craft" (Olaniyan, 1985). Kano attained historical prominence in the fourteenth century with its fine indigo-dyed cloth that was traded for goods from North Africa. Even before the discovery of cotton, other materials had been used for cloth. The Igbo, for example, made cloth from the fibrous bark of trees. The Asante also were famous for their cotton and barkcloth (kente and adwumfo).

Economists define capital as anything that is not wanted for its own sake but aids in the production of further goods. Thus, Robinson Crusoe's fishing net was a capital good; similarly tractors, industrial machines, and scythes. By popular usage, however, capital has come to mean funds or money needed to operate or start a business. In indigenous Africa, capital funds were generally scarce. There were banks in colonial Africa, but the natives lacked the collateral to obtain credit. To secure initial start-up capital for fishing and commercial operations, they turned to two traditional sources of finance. One was the "family pot." Each extended family had a fund into which members made contributions according to their means. While members were not coerced to contribute, failure to do so effectively extinguished one's access to the pot.

The fund was used for both consumption and investment. For example, it was used to cover funeral expenses, weddings, the educational costs of the more gifted among them, extension of the family house, or as capital. Among the Ewe seine fishermen of Ghana, the family pot was called agbadoho. Members borrowed from this pot to purchase their fishing nets and paid back the loans. The second source of finance was a revolving credit scheme that was widespread across Africa. It was called susu in Ghana, esusu in Yoruba, tontines or chilembe in Cameroon and stokfel in South Africa. Typically, a group of say ten people would contribute perhaps $100 into a fund. When the fund reached a certain amount, say $1,000, it was handed over to the members in turn. To be operational, such a scheme required a liberal dose of trust among members and somehow the natives managed to make it work. In fact, for many businesses in the indigenous and informal sector, the loan club was the primary source of capital.

In fact, if the same susu scheme of the African natives were organized in the United States, it would be called a credit union. A credit union is simply an association of individuals who pool their savings together to lend only to themselves (the members). A 1989 study found that: "In Cameroon, a survey of 360 businesses showed that more than half started with help from the tontines or chilembe" (South, February 1989, 25). Also, "A sample of 398 village households in rural Niger in 1986 indicated that informal credit accounted for 84 percent of total loans and was equal to 17 percent of agricultural income. Informal tontines (rotating savings and credit associations) predominate. Out of a sample of 56 tontines in 22 villages, some had only 4 members, other more than 40. The average member contribution ranged from 100 CFA francs (25 cents) to CFA 25,000 ($70). The total size of all 56 tontines, as measured by member contributions per meeting, was the equivalent of $72,000. This suggests a promising base for deposit mobilization in rural Niger" (World Bank, World Development Report, 1989, 113).

One could also borrow money by pledging farms, a practice common in Ghana and Nigeria (Hill, 1987). If borrowing was not possible, one could form a partnership with a person with capital. "A common arrangement involved three partners who shared the returns from a venture equally. In trading ventures, one partner supplied the capital, one transported the goods and braved the hazards of the trail, and the other organized the partnership, which in some cases involved little more than getting the capitalist in touch with someone who had the stamina and courage to make the trip" (Miracle, 1971).

Profit was never an alien concept to Africa. Throughout its history, there have been numerous entrepreneurs. The aim of traders and numerous brokers or middlemen was profit and wealth. In the brokerage business, the middlemen kept a fixed proportion of the proceeds. For example, among the Egba and Ijebu brokers of palm oil in Nigeria in the 1850s, a quarter of the price went to the broker and three-quarters to African suppliers (Newbury, 1971). Profit calculations were always on the mind of African traders. For example, "The Nupe saw to it that the prices of goods corresponded closely variations in supply and demand, above all, to seasonal fluctuations. They also made sure that distance between the area of production and market, and the additional labour and loss of time involved in transport, enter into the calculation of price and profit" (Skinner, 1964, 218).

Profit made was private property; it was for the traders to keep, not for the chiefs or rulers to expropriate. On the Gold Coast in the seventeenth century, there existed men of wealth, such as the Akrosang Brothers and Edward Barter of Cape Coast, Aban and John Kabes of Komenda, John Kurankye of Annomabo, Asomani and Peter Passop of Akwamu and Accra, and John Konny of Ahanta (Daaku, 1971). Chiefs did not sequestrate their wealth for equal distribution to all tribesmen. The natives chose what they did with their profit. The traditional practice was to share the profit. Under the abusa scheme devised by the cocoa farmers of Ghana at the beginning of this century, net proceeds were divided into three parts: a third went to the owner of the farm, another third went to hired laborers and the remaining third was set aside for farm maintenance and expansion. Under the less common abunu system, profits were shared equally between the owner and the workers. Variants of this profit-sharing schemes were extended beyond agriculture to commerce and fishing.

Property Rights

Free Market, Free Trade Tradition

There were two types of markets and trade: the small village market and the large markets that served as long-distance interregional trade centers. Rural markets often were sited at bush clearings or at the intersection of caravan routes. As Polly Hill (1987) asserted: "Rural periodic markets are such ancient institutions in many parts of West Africa and the literature on African markets is vast" (54). Many of the precolonial rural markets of West Africa provided for the needs of local producers, consumers, and traders and also served as foci for long-distance traders. Some rural markets operated daily, depending on the volume of trade. In Nigeria, "Every village and town had markets which were attended in the morning or evening and in some cases, throughout the day. These markets were held either daily or periodically. The daily markets were local exchange points where producers, traders and consumers met to sell and buy. The periodic markets were organized on a cyclical basis of every three, four, five and sixteen days to feed the daily markets. Every community had a market cycle which enabled traders and buyers to attend different markets on different days" (Falola, 1985, 105).

The local markets had two important characteristics. The first was their cyclical periodicity (Skinner, 1964, 215). Market days would be rotated among a cluster of villages. For example, Yoruba, Dahomey and Guro markets operated on five-day cycles. Igbo rural markets were on a four-day or multiple of four-day cycle while Mossi markets ran on a three-day or 21-day cycle. The second characteristic of rural markets was the segregation of vendors or merchants according to the products they sold. Tomato sellers, for example, were all seated in one section of the market. The object was to promote competition. As Falola (1985) observed, segregation "made it convenient for buyers to locate the regular section of each commodity, to choose from a wide variety of goods, and to buy at a fair price since the traders had to compete with one another at the same time" (106).

Market Regulations and Controls

In the Mossi markets:

Kojo Yelpaala (1983) also found that, in Dagaaba markets, "There was the freedom to buy and sell any commodity within the market environ- ment (daa). Free and voluntary interaction between buyers and sellers produced a market-determined price. When this condition was violated, the transactions were said to result in fao (robbery) in the sense that the buyer or seller might extort a price lower or higher price than the market-determined price, thereby reducing social welfare" (370). The Importance of Markets The village market performed vital economic, social, and political functions that were well understood by the chiefs and the people. The marketplace was the central nervous system of the community. In fact, as Skinner (1962) observed of the Mossi of Ghana, "whenever and wherever there is a large gathering of Mossi there is a market. The rural market is the center of Mossi social life, and friends as well as enemies meet within its confines. What Mangin wrote some 40 years ago is still true: 'Every self-respecting Mossi - man or woman, child or elder - must go to market at least once in a while were it only to look . . . and to be looked at, if he can put on some handsome clothes.' Except for the Moslems who are now experimenting with a form of Purdah, there are few persons who do not go to market" (168). Among the Akan of Ghana, Daniel F. McCall (1962) noted that the marketplace was not only "the source of food and clothing for the family, it is the place where the wife and mother spends most of her waking day" (65).

In the 1850s, an American missionary, T. J. Bowen, provided a vivid description of the importance of Yoruba markets: The most attractive object next to the curious old town itself - and it is always old - is the market. This is not a building, but a large area, shaded with trees, and surrounded and sometimes sprinkled over with little open sheds, consisting of a very low thatched roof surmounted on rude posts. Here the women sit and chat all day, from early morning till 9 o'clock at night, to sell their various merchandise. The principal marketing hour, and the proper time to see all the wonders, is the evening. At half an hour before sunset, all sorts of people, men, women, girls, travelers lately arrived in the caravans, farmers from the fields, and artisans from their houses, are pouring in from all directions to buy and sell, and talk. At the distance of half a mile their united voices roar like the waves of the sea (Bascom, 1984, 25).

In East Africa, studies by Gulliver (1962) also showed that markets were extremely important to the Arusha because markets provided them their "main opportunity for personal contact with the Masai in the conscious efforts to learn and imitate all they could of Masai culture." The rural market served many purposes. 1. It provided peasants with the opportunity to exchange goods or occasional agricultural surpluses and to purchase what they could not produce themselves. 2. It provided an indispensable avenue for social intercourse: to meet people, to gossip, or to discuss and keep abreast of local affairs. Dancers, singers, musicians, and other artists often went to the markets to display their skills. Work parties and weddings often took place at the markets. 3. It served as a center of interethnic contact and channels of communication (White, 1987, 41). It was at the market that important information about foreign cultures, medicine, product improvements, and new technologies was exchanged. As such, the market acted as an integrative force, a place for cultural and normative exchange. 4. It often served as the meeting place for important political events such as durbars and village assemblies convened by the traditional rulers. 5. It served as an important area for communication and dissemination of information. Among the Mossi of Ghana, "the market is the main communication center of Mossi society and new of happenings in the region can be heard there. If a person is in an area one can be sure that the people in the market will know about him, or that he will sooner or later visit the market" (Skinner, 1962). 6. Most marketplaces were associated with religious activities. Markets were consecrated with shrines associated with them. The consecration emanated primarily out of the need for peace and calm at the market place. It was believed "such consecration would guarantee that supernatural sanctions would back up the political authorities in their maintenance of peace in the marketplace" (Bohannan, 1964, 215). Clearly, the marketplace was the heart of indigenous African society, the center not only of economic activity but also of political, social, judicial, and communication activities. Perhaps the easiest way to annihilate an ethnic group was to destroy its markets. For such a destruction would assail the core of the society and the extended family itself. The importance of markets in traditional African society has not diminished even today. As West Africa magazine (3-9 April, 1989) reported: Sixty years ago Cotonou was a cluster of villages surrounded by lagoons. Today, it is the economic capital of Benin with a population of 170,000. Its nerve centre is the Dantokpa Market. Animated from early morning to late at night, scores of small retailers line its voms, or streets. Mobylette repair shops, dressmakers, millers preparing corn flour and cabinet-makers carving red wood ply their trades next to traditional healers patiently waiting for clients. Vendors of pimento, peppers, spices and vegetables with piquant odors stand behind their stalls, while itinerant peddlers are everywhere selling dried fish, potato-fritters and corn flour.

Near the old port are the stands selling textiles, the domain of the "Mama Benz." These vigorous business women usually ride in shining Mercedes cars, hence their name. Impressive by their girth and the sumptuous cloth they wear, their spectacular success has been built on the sale of colorful textiles, most of which they import from the Netherlands. (514) In indigenous Africa, the occupational system and the family structure were functionally related. Women have always dominated market activity in Africa. A benighted attempt to destroy or reduce the scale of operations of an indigenous African market and the consequent decline in female participation in market activity would send shock waves through the entire family system. The market was so important in indigenous Africa that Skinner (1962) asserted emphatically that: "No African chief can refuse to hear a case brought to his attention at market (though he may postpone it until a regular court hearingy and the extended family itself. The importance of markets in traditional African society has not diminished even today. As West Africa magazine (3-9 April, 1989) reported: Sixty years ago Cotonou was a cluster of villages surrounded by lagoons. Today, it is the economic capital of Benin with a population of 170,000. Its nerve centre is the Dantokpa Market. Animated from early morning to late at night, scores of small retailers line its voms, or streets. Mobylette repair shops, dressmakers, millers preparing corn flour and cabinet-makers carving red wood ply their trades next to traditional healers patiently waiting for clients. Vendors of pimento, peppers, spices and vegetables with piquant odors stand behind their stalls, while itinerant peddlers are everywhere selling dried fish, potato-fritters and corn flour. ******************************************************************************

Near the old port are the stands selling textiles, the domain of the "Mama Benz." These vigorous business women usually ride in shining Mercedes cars, hence their name. Impressive by their girth and the sumptuous cloth they wear, their spectacular success has been built on the sale of colorful textiles, most of which they import from the Netherlands. (514) In indigenous Africa, the occupational system and the family structure were functionally related. Women have always dominated market activity in Africa. A benighted attempt to destroy or reduce the scale of operations of an indigenous African market and the consequent decline in female participation in market activity would send shock waves through the entire family system. The market was so important in indigenous Africa that Skinner (1962) asserted emphatically that: "No African chief can refuse to hear a case brought to his attention at market (though he may postpone it until a regular court hearing). These courts may be the same as - but are often different from - the arbitrating facilities for settling disputes which arise among sellers and customers within the marketplace itself."