The story of the Congo Free State

by Henry Wellington Wack

Concessions Justified.

The justification of the large concessions is to substitute a regular and methodical exploitation of the products of the soil for the system of trading which destroys the natural riches, leaving behind it only the exhausted and mutilated bush. Is it a question of the collection of caoutchouc [rubber],—the native cuts the lianas, bleeds the producing shrub to complete exhaustion. Is it a question of ivory,—the precious product disappears rapidly with the increase of the price, and the easier destruction of the elephants by means of arms of precision. Left to himself the native destroys, and does not concern himself to ask the earth to restore what he has taken from it. At the most he scratches a little of the soil round the villages he inhabits in order to carry out thereon some cultivation of food stuffs. Thus has it already been recorded in our Congo colony that the caoutchouc lianas have nearly disappeared from the coast, and from the banks of the rivers. It would be the same in the end in the regions further removed from the sea, if wise regulations did not put a stop to it.

Quite different would be the value of the soil if new plantations replaced those exhausted by successive harvests, and added new products to those which come without cultivation. Coffee trees and cocoa trees succeed admirably on the Congo. The soil lends itself to all tropical cultivations. As to the collection of caoutchouc, which will long remain one of the principal resources of the country, it demands management and care. It is for this motive that, according to one of the clauses of the cahier des charges annexed to the decrees of concession, the concessionaire companies are bound “to plant and to maintain to the termination of the concession, by replacing those which shall have disappeared, at least 500 feet of caoutchouc plants per ton of caoutchouc produced.”

The contract signed between the State as the proprietor of vacant lands and the concessionaire is the following: The concessionaire is authorised to establish himself on the lands assigned to him, he exercises there for a period of 30 years all rights of possession and exploitation (under reservation of lands allotted to the natives, and of rights of proprietorship previously acquired by third parties); but this lease of 30 years is to be changed into definite proprietorship for all lands which shall have been improved. How is it to be decided whether the lands may be considered as improved? The cahier des charges answers this question with precision. Shall be considered as improved:

1. Lands occupied over at least one-tenth of their surface by buildings;

2. Lands planted over at least one-twentieth of their surface with rich cultivation such as cocoa, coffee, caoutchouc, vanilla, indigo, tobacco, etc.;

3. Lands cultivated over at least one-tenth of their surface with food cultivation such as rice, millet, manioc, etc.;

4. The pasturage on which shall be maintained during at least five years beasts for breeding and fattening at the rate of two heads of large beasts or four heads of small beasts per 10 hectares[40];

5. The parts of forests of a superficies of at least 100 hectares of a single tenancy in which caoutchouc shall have been regularly collected for at least five years at the rate of at least 20 feet of trees or lianas as the average per hectare....

In exchange for these advantages the concessionaire assumes charges which are not defined with less rigour: Fixed annual rents to be paid to the colony, share of the profits, 15 per cent. of the company’s receipts going to the local budget, obligation to float on the watercourses traversing the concession steamboats of a fixed model, all without prejudice to the payment of a security....