The African Husbandman

by Allan, William; Tilley, Helen

• ISBN13: 9783825830878
• ISBN10: 382583087X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-06-09
• Publisher: Lit Verlag

Summary

The African Husbandman helped a generation of scholars and officials to appreciate that Africans' agricultural practices were both more complex and more malleable than was often thought. Allan's work also pioneered research methods that wedded ethnographic and ecological fieldwork in ways that demonstrated the inextricable links between social arrangements, environmental conditions, and land use patterns. If certain facets of Allan's analysis have now come under scrutiny, his general tenet that to improve agricultural prospects in Africa one first has to understand it from the cultivators' point of view has only been strengthened with time. As long as there are individuals struggling to make sense of African agricultural productivity, The African Husbandman will remain a classic.

Table of Contents

Part I THE BASIS OF AFRICAN LAND-USE
Soils and Agricultural Systems
The Ecological Basis of Land-use	3	(2)
Shifting Cultivation	5	(3)
The Human Carrying Capacity of Land	8	(1)
Soil and Land Classification and Mapping	9	(2)
Soil Work in Africa	11	(2)
Use of Ecology in Land Classification and Mapping	13	(2)
Application of Ecological Survey to the Study of Traditional Agricultural Systems in Northern Rhodesia	15	(5)
Cultivable and Uncultivable Land
Variations in the Cultivability of Land	20	(2)
Economic, Technical, Demographic, and Social Factors Affecting the Extent to which Land may be Cultivated	22	(2)
Estimation of the Cultivable Percentage of Land	24	(6)
The Land-Use Factor
Definition of the Factor	30	(1)
Classification of Land in Accordance with the Land-Use Factor	30	(5)
Assessment of the Factor	35	(3)
The Normal Surplus of Subsistence Agriculture
The ``Normal Surplus''	38	(1)
Sales of African-Produced Maize in Northern Rhodesia	38	(6)
The Role of the Beer Party in Traditional Agriculture	44	(1)
Other Uses of the Normal Surplus	44	(1)
Hunger Months and Famine Years	45	(4)
The Cultivation Factor
Climatic Conditions in East and West Africa	49	(5)
Estimation of the Cultivation Factor: Northern Rhodesian Systems	54	(5)
Effect of Climate on the Cultivation Factor: Double Rainfall, Equatorial, and Northern Savannah Regions	59	(7)
The Citemene Systems
Small-Circle and Large-Circle Citemene	66	(3)
Origin and Distribution of the Systems	69	(2)
The Grassland System of the Aisa Mambwe	71	(1)
Effects of Citemene Burning on the Yield of Crops	72	(2)
Weaknesses of the Systems	74	(3)
Critical Population Density: The Lamba System
Main Gardens of the Lamba	77	(2)
Garden Extensions	79	(3)
Subsidiary Gardens	82	(1)
Origin of the Concept of Critical Population Density	83	(3)
Estimate of Critical Population Density for the Lamba System and Environment	86	(4)
Criticism of the Estimate	90	(3)
Additional Considerations	93	(6)
Eastern Plateau and Valley Systems of Northern Rhodesia
Traditional Practices of the Ngoni-Chewa	99	(2)
The Senga System and its Affinities	101	(1)
Carrying Capacities and Critical Population Densities	102	(5)
The Carrying Capacity of Citemene
The Lala of Serenje	107	(6)
The Western Lala	113	(5)
The Swaka Semi-Citemene System	118	(4)
Land Problems in the Serenje and Mkushi Districts	122	(8)
Large-Circle Citemene	130	(3)
Land Problems in the Abercorn District	133	(3)
Kinship Obligations and the Population-Land Pattern	136	(2)
Special Environments
The Aisa Mambwe and the Fipa	138	(2)
The Luapula Valley	140	(3)
The Bangweulu Islands	143	(4)
The Valley Tonga	147	(5)
The Barotse Plain	152	(9)
Part II ENVIRONMENTS AND SYSTEMS OF LAND-USE
Banana Cultures of East Africa
Bananas and Plantains as Food Crops	161	(1)
The Chagga of Kilimanjaro	162	(4)
The Gishu of Mount Elgon	166	(4)
Buganda	170	(1)
The Haya of Bukoba	171	(5)
Other Regions of High Population Density in East Africa
Kikuyuland	176	(4)
The Nyanza Province of Kenya	180	(2)
Kigezi and Ruanda-Urundi	182	(3)
Teso	185	(6)
Sukumaland	191	(2)
Upland and Coastal Regions of Tanganyika	193	(3)
The Matengo Highlands	196	(3)
Ukara Island	199	(8)
Regions of Low Population Density in East Africa
High and Low Population Densities and Water Supplies	207	(1)
Gogoland	208	(2)
The Miombo Woodlands	210	(2)
The Mukuwa System of Tunduru	212	(1)
The Makonde Thicket System	213	(3)
The Mashokora Cultivation of the Coast	216	(3)
Forest Lands of the Congo Basin and Ghana
The Equatorial Forest Environment	219	(1)
The System of the Bakumu	219	(4)
Population Densities in the Congo Basin	223	(1)
Forest Regions of Ghana	224	(9)
The Northern Savannah
The Forest Margin and the Volta Plains	233	(3)
The Dagomba System	236	(5)
Concentric Ring Cultivation	241	(6)
Areas of Intensive Agriculture	247	(2)
Herdsmen-Cultivators	249	(6)
Part III HUNTERS AND HERDSMEN
Hunters and Food-Gatherers
Remnants of the Economy of Savagery	255	(1)
African Survivors	256	(5)
Land Requirements of Hunting and Food-Gathering Systems	261	(5)
Land Tenure and the Population-Land Balance	266	(5)
The Last of the Old Stone Age	271	(3)
From Hunting to Husbandry
The Neolithic Revolution and the Genesis of Civilisation	274	(4)
African History	278	(6)
Movement and Migration	284	(3)
The Pastoralists
Origin and Survival of Pastoral Communities	287	(4)
The Livestock Carrying Capacity of Range Land	291	(3)
Land Tenure	294	(2)
Nomadic Patterns	296	(6)
Land Requirements of Pastoralists	302	(7)
Population Densities in Pastoral Regions	309	(6)
Dynamics of Pastoral Economics	315	(4)
Change and Development in Pastoral Societies	319	(16)
Part IV CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT
The Peace of the Suzerain Powers
Fossilisation of Population-Land Patterns, the Money Economy, Loss of Land	335	(6)
Population Growth	341	(5)
Cash Cropping	346	(14)
Land-Holding
Traditional African Land Tenure	360	(9)
Land as a Saleable Commodity	369	(6)
The Cycle of Land Degeneration
Effects of Population Pressure	375	(4)
Subdivision and Fragmentation of Land	379	(6)
Soil Erosion	385	(4)
Success and Failure	389	(3)
The New Farmers
The Rehabilitation of the Kikuyu Lands	392	(14)
Planned Farming in Uganda and Tanganyika	406	(7)
African Farming in Northern Rhodesia	413	(9)
Farmers of Nyasaland and Southern Rhodesia: The Land Husbandry Act of Southern Rhodesia	422	(6)
Mixed Farming in Northern Nigeria	428	(2)
The Failure of Group Farming	430	(7)
Remoulding the Old Systems
Paysannats and Fermettes in the Congo	437	(9)
Resettlement Work in Northern Rhodesia	446	(6)
The Resettlement Areas Fifteen Years Later	452	(7)
The Problem of the Serenje Lala	459	(2)
New Horizons
Economic Transition	461	(7)
The Role of Agriculture	468	(7)
Bibliography	475	(10)
Index	485