No abstract

In most narratives, the beginning of the oil palm industry in Southeast Asia boils down to entrepreneurial spirit, scientific research, and good fortune. The colonial context in which the industry emerged barely figures in the story. This article argues that colonial power was critical, providing access to land and labour that proved more important than plant selection, capital, or technology. The plantation model pushed the region ahead of Africa as the leading exporter of palm oil by the late 1930s, but its future was in doubt as the Depression and Second World War shattered the colonial order.

This article uses food as a window on the British colonization of Northern Nigeria between 1900 and 1914. It examines how Britons consumed food in the material and social contexts of colonialism and argues that food was an important tool for defining boundaries between rulers and the ruled. Colonial attitudes toward food expose the tension between propaganda and practice in contemporary texts that enthusiastically supported Britain’s “civilizing mission” in Nigeria.

No abstract

No abstract