O Level Revision : History - Economic Developments in Zimbabwe during the Colonial Era

Pass laws

• They were important for they controlled Africans’ right to freedom of movement.
• They  applied  to  African  men;  controlled  the movement of men looking for jobs in towns.
• After 1902 all men over the age of 14 were required to register at the pass office.
• They  were  then  issued  with  an  identification certificate.
• Between 1902 and 1913 a man needed a pass to move from one district to another within the same country.
•  In 1947 the age of registration was raised to 16years.
• Without an identification certificate it was illegal for a man to work for more than 4 days. In 1957 it was extended to 7 days.
• Men needed a pass to travel outside their location into the white areas of the town between 9pm and

6am.

• The Pass Laws were a burden to the Africans.
• Many  Africans  were  subjected  to  prosecutionbecause of the pass laws, e.g. in 1932, 17 860 African men were prosecuted under the pass laws.

• People convicted under the pass laws were fined.
• These  fines  were  a  source  of  revenue  for  the government.

• Africans used a number of ways to resist the pass laws e.g.:

-     mutilating certificates;

-     refusing to produce them;

-     not possessing the registration certificate;

-     using other people’s passes.

Gender  issues under colonial rule

• Women did not carry pass registration books.
• Customary laws  were  crafted  by  the  colonial officials.
• One of their inventions was that African women of all ages were legally the same as children and could not make decisions on their own in the capitalist economy.

-     Because of this, till 1982 an African woman could not own property in her own name.

-     She  could  not  get  married  or  get  divorced without the consent of her father.

-     She could not live away from her family as an independent person if her male guardian did not approve.

-     If she was married and employed her wages belonged to the husband.

-     She could not make major decisions about herchildren.

-     Women were paid less salary for the same job with men, e.g. teachers.Women were therefore controlled by men.

• By 1919 rural men began to complain about the movement of women into towns and a law was passed that made it a crime for a woman to run away from her husband – the law was against native adultery.
• To restrict the women’s movement, the Europeans began refusing to allocate urban housing to women.

• They made women to depend more on men and this encouraged informal relationships and temporary marriages in towns called ‘kuchaya mapoto’ (co- habitating).

Labour  and  early  industrial development

• The first industry to develop in Southern Rhodesia was the mining industry.

• The BSAC rulers had hoped to get rich quickly.
• The whites faced problems in extracting the gold because the gold deposits were scattered.

• The gold lay deep underground.
• Many deposits had already been mined.
• They  began  to  mine  other  minerals  like  coal, chrome, lead and copper.

• Note that, the Europeans depended on agriculture alongside mining.

• African labour became the basis of settler economic development.

• The Africans had to be forced to work because of the poor working conditions.

• The mine workers faced the following problems:

-     They were poorly fed, e.g. they were given sub-standard meat and half ground mealie- meal.

-     They were paid low wages.

-     They lived in barrack-like compounds which were dirty and overcrowded.

-     There was no privacy in the accommodation.

-     Workers could be easily maimed or killed in accidents as mines were dangerous.

-     They had no protective clothing.

-     Workers, if injured, were sent home without compensation.

-     Many   suffered   from   sexually   transmitted diseases and malnutrition as they were not allowed to stay with their spouses.

-     They had no system of medical treatment.

-     Workers were forced to work overtime.

-     Poor sanitation facilities.

Recruitment of labour

• There were two kinds of forced labour in Southern Rhodesia, namely:

(i)   Direct forced labour; and

(ii)  Indirect forced labour.

• Direct forced  labour  lasted until  about  1901.  It involved  state  officials who  dragged  men  from villages and sjamboked them to force them to work in the mines. They were supervised by the police.
• The police would shoot deserters.
• However, after a few years it became clear that the method was not an effective one.

• Then the mine owners and government tried to import workers from North Africa. It was not successful.
• Indians and Chinese were employed.
• They also  began  to  use  migrant  labour  from Nyasaland, Mozambique and Northern Rhodesia. However, it proved to be costly.
• It was then decided to use the labour in Southern Rhodesia.

• They imposed high taxes and closed down other economic opportunities available to Africans.

• This was indirect forced labour.
• Here is a list of some of the taxes imposed on Africans from 1893 to 1934:

-     Officials collected 2  611  heads  of  cattle in Mashonaland as tax (1895).

-     Wife tax – 10 shillings per year to be paid for every wife after the first one (1903).

-     Dog tax (1912).

-     Grazing fees imposed in Matabeleland (1912).

-     Cattle – dipping was made compulsory at one/ two shillings per cow (1914).

-     2 shillings and 6 pence tax on each slaughtered cow (1931).

-     6 pence tax per head of cattle (1934).

-     A tax of 10 shillings per adult male per year called hut tax (1894).

• The government used the Rhodesia Native Labour Bureau (RNLB) to make labour available to mines and farms.
• It  recruited  labour  and  forced Africans  to  sign contracts for long periods.

• The other method used to get labour was to take the land of the Africans; land was the means of production used for:

-     Grazing their cattle

-     Fetching firewood

-     Growing crops

-     Mining of minerals

-     Hunting

-     Gathering fruits

• By 1930 the good agricultural and grazing land had been allocated to white settlers.

• Africans were forced into reserves.
• Reserves were unproductive, overcrowded, dry and hilly. They also had poor rainfall.

Initial expansion of peasant farming up to the 1930s

Some effects of colonialism benefited local agriculture in the early years. Initially agriculture prospered due to the following reasons:

• The capitalist  system  created  a  market  and  the peasants began to produce for sale and not only for subsistence.
• The hut tax system under colonialism made most men to switch roles. Men were forced into growing crops to sell in order to get cash to pay taxes.
• They used some foreign tools like the plough.
• They  still  possessed  the  means  of  production,namely land.

• The first group of Europeans were not farmers but hunters. They did not want to do farming.

• Improved transport – Africans moved away from hills into areas where they had to cut down transport costs.
• Agricultural  productivity    increased    because wages paid to Africans were very low and people were ill-treated so they decided to concentrate on agriculture.

Methods used to ruin African peasant agriculture

• The white settlers took away African livestock, e.g. about 80% of the Ndebele cattle were taken.

• The 1894 Order-In-Council created the Gwaii andShangani reserves.

• In Mashonaland and Manicaland grain stores were destroyed and taken in the 1896-97 war.
• They took the fertile land from the Africans.
• They reduced the size of land set aside for the Africans e.g. the Native Reserve Commission of 1914-1915  reduced  the  reserves  by  one  million acres.
• The  Rhodesian    Government    ruined   African agriculture by creating a white farming community that was heavily subsidised by government.
• They grew similar crops to those grown byAfricans.
• European farmers had the following advantages:

-     Ultra cheap labour.

-     Nearness to the main roads and railway.

-     Loans from the land bank of 1912 to buy inputs such as seeds, fertiliser and machinery.

-     Their agricultural products were paid much higher prices than Africans’.

-     They    were    given    agricultural    scientific education through the agricultural journal and this was never given to Africans.

• By the 1930s African commercial agriculture had become almost insignificant.
• The  government     pursued     a     policy     of proletarianisation. It is a process of making people work for others by selling their labour power in order to survive.
• A number of laws were introduced that destroyed

African agriculture:

-     Land  Apportionment  Act   of   1930   which confined African  producers  to  separate  and non-productive areas.

-     Maize Control Amendment Act of 1934.

-     Beef Levy of 1931.

Settler agriculture

As time went on, European miners became broke. Companies were forced to close and the white people began to consider farming as a better option.

• The first serious action came from the directors of the BSAC who set up a land settlement committee in 1905.
• An  Estates  Department  on  land  was  set  up  in Southern Rhodesia in 1908.

• The Rhodesian Government created the Department of Agricultural Journal.
• The  company  began  to  work  on  crops  such  as tobacco and citrus fruits, and on cattle ranching.

• In 1912 a land bank was established to give loans to Europeans.

• Some incentives to encourage European settlement were introduced, e.g. the price of land was reduced, assurance of cheap African labour and generous loans.
• The Europeans got land on the Highveld which was well watered, and with rich soils.

• These agricultural policies resulted in a rise in the production of maize, tobacco and cattle.

• European agriculture began to grow for the export market.

• Great emphasis  was  placed  on  tobacco,  soya beans, maize, fruits and wheat. Meat was exported to Germany, Britain, Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia), South Africa and Belgium Congo (now DRC).
• Africans who remained on European land refused to enter into labour agreements.

• These Africans were harassed and most of them moved away from European land into the reserves.

• Those who remained continued to pay the excessive grazing fees, dipping fees, hut tax, dog tax, etc.

• Many of the poorer Europeans went to extremes in order to get rich quickly. They used the following methods:

-     They stole African livestock.

-     Employed   Africans   and   dismissed   them without pay.

-     Demanded a wide range of high fees.

-     They accused Africans of all types of crimes in order to steal their cattle.

Land  Apportionment Act of 1930

At least 50 000 families were moved off the so-called European land in 1930. They aimed to:

• Get more cheap labour.
• Get more land.
• Increase productivity.
• Destroy African competition.
• Destroy African independence and cause artificial poverty.

Maize  Control Act of 1931 and  1934

• It was designed to destroy African agriculture so as not to compete with Europeans.

• The Rhodesian white farmers did not want African agriculture  to  prosper  for  it  would  lead  to  the 

creation of a ‘native state’ and competition with white farmers.

• African  farmers’  maize  was  graded  separately, given a lower grade, lower price and sold last.

• As a result, Africans were forced only to grow crops they needed for their food.

• European farmers wanted government help in the financing and procurement  of  seeds,  fertilisers; protection from drought and pests; provisions of harvest labour and transport of grain to the market.
• Agriculture was insured like any other business venture.

• It resulted in the creation of many small control boards, e.g. Tobacco Control Board, Dairy Control Board, Tobacco Marketing Board and Grain Marketing Board.
• As a result European agriculture prospered. African poverty directly contributed to the success of European agriculture.

African  reaction to economic exploitation

• Early protest movements were formed, including trade unions,   e.g.   Reformed   Industrial   and Commercial Workers Union led by C. Mzingeli and Masotsha Ndlovu.
• Blacks deserted work.
• They went on strike, e.g. 1948 general strike with workers demanding better wages.

• Barter trade – African workers would steal goods from their employers and barter trade.

Exercise ...

(a)  List any six uses of land to the Africans.     [6]

(b)  Outline the methods used by settlers to destroy African peasant agriculture by the settler government up to 1950.                             [11]

(c) To   what   extent   were   these   methods successful? [8]