THE MINING AND EXTRACTIVE INDUSTRIES IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The mining industry is a sector that involves the extraction and processing of mineral resources

from the earth. It includes activities such as exploration, extraction, refining, smelting, and

marketing of various metals and minerals. The mining industry is important for many countries as

it provides raw materials, jobs, and revenue. Some of the major commodities mined worldwide

are coal, iron ore, gold, copper, and rare earths. The mining industry faces many challenges and

opportunities such as environmental and social risks, technological innovation, talent shortage,

and changing demand patterns. The industry needs to adapt to these forces and find ways to create

value and sustainability for its stakeholders.

Extractive industry is a term that refers to any process that involves the extraction of raw

materials from the earth to be used by consumers. The extractive industry includes two main

sectors which are mining, and oil and gas. The mining sector covers the extraction of mineral ores,

metals, and aggregates such as coal, iron, gold, copper, and stone. The oil and gas sector covers

the extraction of fossil fuels, such as crude oil, natural gas, and coal-bed methane. The extractive

industry is important for many countries as it provides energy, materials, income, and employment.

However, it also poses significant environmental and social challenges, such as pollution, land

degradation, biodiversity loss, human rights violations, corruption, and conflict. Therefore, the

extractive industry needs to adopt responsible and sustainable practices that balance the economic

benefits with the environmental and social costs.

When analysing the structure of the nineteenth century economy of West Africa,

particularly with regard to the integration of the sub-region into the international economy, much

emphasise are placed on agricultural produce as the most tangible aspect of the primary goods.

However, sizeable amount of mineral resources are also produced and exported from different

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parts of West Africa to the outside world. Mining and extraction had been practised in West Africa

centuries before the coming of the Europeans. Gold, for instance, was extensively mined in the

ancient empires of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai which flourished between 1000 and 1600 AD. In

fact, it was the knowledge of the huge amount of gold available in West Africa that brought some

of the Europeans to the region in the first instance.

Also, salt was mined in the Sahara and by the coastal inhabitants of the present day Ghana,

while tin was worked by the indigenous people of Jos. The knowledge of iron and steel was very

common in many parts of West Africa. Mineral deposits are huge in various parts of West Africa.

Gold is in abundant in Ghana, Nigeria, Cote d’Ivoire, and Guinea; tin abounds in Nigeria; iron and

steel are found in commercial quantities in Sierra Leone, Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, and Nigeria;

aluminium is available in Ghana, Guinea, and Togo; coal is available in Nigeria; diamonds are

found in Ghana, Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Cote d’Ivoire, manganese in Ghana; and phosphates in

Togo. Mineral oil is also deposited in Nigeria and Ghana.

Features of the Mining and Extractive Industry: There were about four major features

of the mining and extractive industries in the nineteenth century West Africa. These include the

ownership and control of the mines, the provision of labour, the provision of transport, and the

marketing of the produce.

Ownership and Control of the Mines: Unlike agriculture the production of mines did not

received adequate encouragement from the colonial government. The government did not want to

take huge risk in mining. Therefore, the extractive industry was left in the hands of the private

firms. The colonial government maintained a laisez-faire attitude toward the mining industry,

leaving it in the hands of private companies which paid concession fees and taxes. Private

European commercial establishments were the first to establish a foothold in the mining industries.

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In many places, individual prospectors pioneered the initial success in the mining. In other places,

pioneering work was done by companies, most often not established or experienced in mining, but

whose area of operation gave them the advantage of speculating on the profitability of such

ventures. For instance, the Royal Niger Company started tin mining in Nigeria in 1905. The

European mining operation in West Africa was dominated by small firms, although there were

fairly large ones such as the Ashanti Gold Fields Corporation founded in 1897, and the

Amalgamated Tin Mines of Nigeria Limited formed in 1939. The prominence of the small

expatriate firms was because of two main reasons. First, the minerals could be worked on a small

scale and with less massive financial resources. The second reason was the problem of transporting

heavy machinery from the coast to the mines. While the small firms could transport their small or

medium-sized machines, the big firms found it difficult to do so for their huge machines.

Labour: At the beginning, little skill was needed in the extractive industries. For a long

time, machines were not introduced and local miners applied their pre-colonial traditional skills.

Therefore, the gold miners of Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire employed the local Asante, Fante, Kru

population who were knowledgeable in the gold mining. In the same way, the local Hausa

immigrants and Plateau inhabitants in Jos and Bauchi areas were engaged in the tin operations.

However, with the introduction of machinery, these categories of workers were employed as

unskilled labourers who worked on the digging and the carrying sections of the mining operations.

When machinery was introduced it became essential that skilled labour be acquired. At first, the

highly skilled parts of the work were done by the European expatriate employers of the firms. The

semi-skilled and clerical works were done by the educated people from the coastal cities whose

major qualification was the ability to speak English or French. When these educated people

acquired enough on-the-job experience, they sometimes replaced the expatriate workers because

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they drew lesser pay. The local mine workers were paid very low wage and worked under severe

conditions. Seasonally, many of local mine workers left the mines immediately the first rains begin

because they were originally farmers.

Transport: The need of the mining industry for easy and economical means of transport

resulted in the building or the extension of railways and roads in many parts in West Africa. For

instance, the Eastern railways in Nigeria would probably not have been built when it was built but

for the need to transport coal from Enugu to the coast and to the tin mine in Jos. In the like manner,

a light railway was constructed linking Buruku with the major Lagos-Kano trunk. In addition, the

electricity needed in the tin mines indirectly contributed to the electrification of Jos and the

surrounding mines towns.

Marketing: The cost of production of most of the mineral resources in West Africa was

relatively high than in other producing countries. This made the region’s minerals to be less

competitive in the market. The extractive industry did not develop in West Africa until after the

Second World. This was when the transport problem had been alleviated by the construction of

railway and feeder roads. The labour problems of skill and cheapness were also overcome. The

market for the mineral products of West Africa were the metropolitan countries concerned. The

prices were determined by the market situation in the metropolis, the volume of production was

conditioned by the demand there. This meant that any crisis in the metropolis would affect the

economy of the colony concerned. International crises such as the World Wars and the economic

depression that engulfed Europe during the first half of twentieth century therefore affected the

production and prices of these minerals. While the wars raised the demand for tin, the depression

nearly smashed the tin industry in West Africa, as many firms had to fold up.

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 The Major Mining Minerals: Three major minerals including tin, coal, and gold were

worked in large scales in West Africa.

Tin Mining: Nigeria is the major area in West Africa where tin deposit occurs in sufficient

commercial quantities. In the country, the colonial tin mining was pioneered by the Royal Niger

Company which from 1900 sponsored expeditions to explore and determine the size of the deposit

in Bauchi province. By 1906, with the success of the expeditions, the company started its tin

mining operations. Initially, the Company’s operations were modest. Tin boom in 1909 by the

Champion Tin Fields Company (Nigeria) which abandoned its unsuccessful gold prospecting

operations in Ghana to start extracting tin in Nigeria. The success of this company within a year

attracted into the fields over fifty other companies. The world major tin producing countries in

1936 in order of importance were Malaya, Netherland, East Indies, Bolivia, Siam, China, and

Nigeria. These countries together produced over 86 percent of the world’s total output of 180,100

tons during this period. In terms of composition, the labour force in the tin mines consisted of

skilled and unskilled workers. The unskilled workers employed pick, shovel, and head-pans. They

were the Hausa and Plateau people who engaged in hunting and farming but who only came to the

mines for a short period after the harvests. The supervisory and semi-skilled jobs were done by

Yoruba or Igbo southern immigrants who worked as fitters, electricians, and clerks. Many of these

workers were badly treated in terms of remuneration and other conditions of service.

Fluctuation in prices and uncertainty of the market were matter of concern to many

companies and producer governments. An attempt was made in 1929 by the Tin Producers

Association (an association of British and Dutch producers) to raise price by imposing voluntary

cutbacks in production. But this failed. In 1931 however, the International Tin Control Scheme

was born and this succeeded in imposing compulsory cutbacks, supervised by the International

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Tin Committee representing the signatory governments of Malaya, Netherland, East Indies,

Bolivia, and Great Britain (on behalf of Nigeria). With the adoption of the scheme in Nigeria,

many small firms folded up, having been consumed by bigger ones. Some pooled their resources

together rather than be forced out of the competition. Though the tin industry succeeded in

providing infrastructure like roads, railway, and electricity around the mines, the major concern of

the colonial administrators was not the development of manufacturing or processing industries but

for lifting raw materials to the metropolitan countries.

Coal Mining: The largest deposit of coal in West Africa is located in Nigeria. In 1905,

coal was discovered at Udi owing to the efforts of the officers of the mineral survey of southern

Nigeria. However, mining of coal only began in 1915 by the Railway Department of the colonial

government. The Department took direct responsibilities over coal mining from 1915 to 1950. In

1950, this responsibility was taken over by a management board and thereafter the Nigerian Coal

Corporation, which was established by ordinance. Throughout the first half of the twentieth

century, the government sponsored the coal industry in Nigeria. This sponsorship was because

coal was needed by the Railway Department which bought the largest quantity of the coal produced

in Nigeria and the entire British colonies in West Africa. The Nigerian Railway used around 17,000

tons of coal every month during the first three decades of the twentieth century. Other users of coal

include the Electric Corporation of Nigeria, the Marine Department, and other commercial

concerns. Coal from Nigeria was also exported to Ghana and Sierra Leone. Between 1930 and

1937, Nigeria exported an annual average of about 34,687 tons of coal to Ghana.

The development of the Nigerian coal industry and development of railway were

intertwined. For instance, the opening of the first colliery at Udi influenced the building of the port

of Port Harcourt and the railway that linked Enugu. Also, to facilitate the transportation of coal to

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key areas in Nigeria, the Eastern Railway was extended to Jos and Kaduna Junctions in the 1920s.

In the 1950s, three major coal mines including Obwetti, Iva, and Hayes were erected at Enugu.

However, the coal industry began to decline from 1955 owning to the introduction of diesel engines

to the Nigeria railway. By 1959, the demand for coal had drastically declined, and coal mining

operations soon became uneconomical as a result of the loss of market. An important aspect of

the Nigerian coal industry was the employment and organisation of the force. The majority of the

workers came from nearby villages and were largely illiterates. Compared with the tin industry,

the average wage at the colliery was relatively high and steady.

Gold Mining: The major area where gold was mined was Ghana. Other areas where gold

was produced, though not in exportable quantity as in Ghana, were some areas in Nigeria, Sierra

Leone, Senegal, Guinea, and Cote d’Ivoire. Gold is present in West Africa in the form of alluvial

deposits and from conglomerate reefs. Alluvial gold is present in great quantities in many places

in Ghana. The Ashanti area possesses one of the richest gold mines in the world. The mines were

owned by the Ashanti Goldfields Corporation and reserves could be found at Obuasi, Birim,

Abekobra, and Tarkwa districts. Up to the 1870s, gold production continued to be in the hands of

Ghanaians who mined the minerals. After this period, however, educated Ghanaians from the coast

started acquiring mining concessions in the interior. These were migrants who acted as middlemen

between the pioneering miners and the Europeans, and also organise the miners along the lines of

modern extractive industries.

Some of the African concessions were later bought by the European firms. In 1875, four

Europeans had engaged in gold mining without the aid of machinery. Thereafter, a French trader

and adventurer (J. Bonnet) ventured into the Tarkwa region and gave reports to France of prospects

for gold mines. This led to the formation of the African Gold Coast Company which acquired land

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concessions in 1878. This was followed by three new companies and by 1881 machines of different

kinds had been erected. The successes of these companies started off a gold rush, especially when

the London newspapers blew the reports out of proportion. Adventurers came prospecting for gold,

some fraudulent and some genuine companies were founded. By the last decade of the nineteenth

century, some major problems had reduced the prospect of gold mining. They included the

seasonal nature of labour supply and the inadequacy of the existing means of transport from the

mines to the coast. The labour problem was compounded by the fact that the companies preferred

Kru labourers to local Ghanaians, and had to import, at considerable expense, this group of people

from Liberia. The Kru, however, did not stay very long in Ghana for a long period.

The British administration entered the gold rush. It sent out officers to prospect for gold

especially in the Winneba district. But the private firms performed better, especially the Ashanti

Goldfields Corporation which was established by Mr. Gade in 1897. The company installed the

latest mining gear and permanent houses for workers and for other mining purposes. The company

was successful that in 1898 it offered government a sum £5,000 towards the cost of extending the

Sekondi-Tarkwa railway to Kumasi to pass through the company’s Obuasi concessions.

The twentieth century opened with a renewed gold rush created by the success of the

Ashanti Goldfields Corporation. Within two years, over 3,500 concessions were taken in the

country. Within a year, it was discovered that only 114 concessions were really viable. The chiefs

who granted these concessions had only vague notion of the boundaries of the concessions they

were granting. They, therefore, sometimes granted overlapping concessions which involved

companies in expensive litigations. A definite direction was given to the gold industry in Ghana

with the creation of the first Geological Survey Department. The Department’s director (E. Kitson)

toured the country and reported on the variety of minerals in the country. Production was affected

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during the period of World War One and the depression that followed. Soon after the war, there

was recovery and production increased till 1957 when the country was granted independent.

Practice Questions
A. How would explain the meaning of the Mining and Extractive Industry?
B. Explain the development of any three major mineral resources in West Africa