The agricultural and forest products of British West Africa

by Gerald C. Dudgeon

NEAR THE SOUTHERN GATE, ZARIA.

Fig. 33, [p. 137.]

All the native cottons in the above table are from the Niger and Benue River Provinces, but it is considered probable that large quantities of the product, which are looked for for export, will be obtained from the Kano and Zaria Provinces, and after the opening of the Baro-Kano Railway, the capitals of these may become important cotton-buying and ginning centres. [Figs. 32] and [33] illustrate views of Kano and Zaria.

In all the localities referred to, cotton is generally cultivated as a sole crop, in succession to food crops, and is planted upon shallow ridges from July to September, when the cotton is ready for picking from December to March. Experiments have been made at Baro and Zungeru to raise plants during the dry months by irrigation, but as this causes the fruiting season to occur about the time that the first rain and wind storms commence, the success of this is very uncertain. The necessity for the application of irrigation to this crop is not apparent except as an assistance in lieu of rain when the season of rainfall is late. There is no extreme drought throughout the year, such as is the case in Egypt, where cotton is entirely an irrigated crop.

In the Ilorin district, in the vicinity of Shari, a somewhat extensive area is seen under cotton, and the mode of planting is similar to that applied on a smaller scale near Rabba, Jebba, Bida, and Egga. A piece of land is usually selected for a cotton field upon which Guinea corn and millet crops have been grown continuously for a long period, and which has consequently become rather exhausted. This is often permitted to lie fallow for several years, after which cotton is planted in drills on ridges or mounds in July or August. No manure is applied. Generally about a dozen or more seeds are put in each drill, and in this way it is estimated that about a bushel and a half of seed per acre is required. Picking commences in December, and lasts until February, as much as 500 lbs. of seed-cotton per acre being frequently gathered.

In Kano, cotton is often grown in alternation with cassava, and is a manured crop. Large fields are not seen, as the land is chiefly required for food crops, especially in the vicinity of towns, where the population is dense. General improvements in cultivation, and the introduction of ploughing, would enable a much larger area to be put under cultivation, and would permit of the fertile tracts remote from the towns being employed largely for cotton-growing.

The above account indicates the direction in which efforts should be made to ensure the most fertile tract of Northern Nigeria, where the population is also most industrious and dense, becoming an important cotton-growing locality. It may be safely said that the land, climate, and industrious population are existent and suitable, but the population is congested, leaving large fertile areas of land untouched. Transport difficulties have up to the present prevented cultivation of products useful for export, and the non-employment of cattle for ploughing has restricted cultivation to the growth of crops entirely absorbed by local necessity.

Improvement of Plant.—In addition to these requirements, with regard to cultivation, a rather better class of cotton is necessary in the Northern Provinces. The local variety might perhaps be sufficiently improved under better cultivation and seed selection, but such a process would be gradual and require the undivided attention of an experienced European officer, working in the districts. It has previously been suggested that the introduction of one of the many Upland American kinds might be advantageous; the local variety approaching that class of plant more nearly than do the varieties occurring in the forest regions farther to the south, where the American varieties have been extensively planted with somewhat variable results. One variety only should be introduced, and this should possess cropping and lint records suitable for European requirements. Georgia or Texas quick-maturing kinds are indicated, but not the lowland kinds such as are grown in the Mississippi valley.

The foregoing remarks apply to those regions only where it seems possible that the quality of cotton which is in most general demand in Lancashire can be extensively grown, but are not applicable to the Niger Valley. As will be seen by a reference to the table of valuations, a cotton exists in the Bassa and Nassarawa Provinces which is comparable with a higher standard grade than Middling American, the type to be produced in the north. Efforts should be made to keep this latter variety free from the possibility of admixture with exotic kinds, and it is therefore advisable that improvement in this class should be confined to seed selection. American cottons have already been introduced into Bassa, but the value of the lint is lower than that of the indigenous kind.

With regard to the cotton grown in the Ilorin Province, the common variety is similar to that of the adjoining country to the south, and it is in this direction that the crop of the whole Province will be sent in the future, as it has been arranged to remove the Ogudu ginnery on the Niger, to which the northern Ilorin cotton has hitherto been sent for sale. An illustration is given showing the position of this ginnery upon the southern bank of the Niger ([Fig. 34]).