Thus, members of each group have tended to identify themselves more with their ethnic group rather than with their country and loyalty to the ethnic group is often more important than loyalty to the state. Unfortunately, West Africa’s leaders have not made greater efforts to unite the different communities in their countries.
The Soso are in Sierra Leone and Guinea while the Kissi are now located in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia. The Senufo are found in Mali, Côte d’Ivoire and Burkina Faso. Today, some of the Ewe live in Ghana, some in Togo and some in Benin. The colonial regimes had created national boundaries which brought peoples together who would otherwise be separated (for example, the Fante and Asante in Ghana) and separated peoples who would otherwise be together. These rulers inherited states that had been created by European colonialists which consisted of different ethnic groups, religions and interests. West African rulers have faced serious challenges in trying to unite their people. Problems of national unity and cohesion: Overview and Case Studies We shall discuss below the major problems that have affected West African countries since the attainment of independence. However, these impressive developments were soon overshadowed by many problems, some of which have still not been solved. The road network was expanded and hospitals and clinics were built.
School enrolment, for example, increased substantially in the first decade of independence. They formulated good policies for the social and economic development of their people. They hoped to transform their newly independent countries so that their citizens would enjoy the fruits of independence, as colonial rule had brought only few benefits to the majority of the people. Most West African leaders were very optimistic about their countries’ future at independence.
Upper volta colonial impact download#
The historical trajectory of the shea trade continues to have implications for current-day shea markets and their actors.Please click this link to download the chapter. Yet, we suggest that French colonial policies failed due to a composite of factors including the limited investment in either the colony or shea as an oilseed crop, adaptation by women shea producers to the extraction of male labour and the trade opportunities created by new international borders, and the ‘blindness’ of colonial officials to the economic, social and cultural functions of periodic local markets used by women shea traders. The colonial state assumed erroneously that little shea trade existed, and that producers would respond positively to market incentives. Colonial effo rts to incorporate Upper Volta, a French colonial backwater, into the world economy was drawn out, heterogenous, and messy. This paper traces the origins of French colonial efforts to develop shea as a commodity of empire from the 1890s to independence in 1960.
Burkinabé women have traded shea kernels and shea butter in periodic local markets, and on a regional scale with the densely-populated West African littoral, for centuries.
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