Photographer: Neville O. Badenock
Copyright holder: Ibo Inc. 2006
Barbados: Sugar and Slavery
The story of Barbados’ development is fascinating
and has its roots in its colonial past.
Barbados is an island in the Eastern Caribbean, known for its:
tropical climate,
beautiful environment
white sandy beaches,
and warm, friendly people.
It has a population of 273,987
people which swells with
tourists throughout the year.
© European Community, 2007
Europe and the world: Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific - a model partnership
At 34km long and 23km wide, Barbados is 430km² and is divided
into 11 parishes.
Take a look at the following hand-drawn map for some clues
to the history of the island…
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
The English first discovered Barbados in 1625. Two years later, they
landed here, in Holetown and claimed the island for the British Empire.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
By the mid-seventeenth century, the white minority’s authoritarian
rule of Barbados was the prototype for European colonialism.
Olaudah Equiano,
pictured here, grew up
in Nigeria.
At the age of eleven he
was sold to white slave
traders who took him
across the Atlantic to
Barbados, where he
was enslaved to a
Royal Navy captain and
later a Quaker
merchant.
Eventually, by carefully
trading and saving, he
earned his freedom,
before moving to
London where he
played a significant role
in the abolitionist
movement.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
The Emancipation Statue seen here symbolises the breaking of the
chains of slavery.
Slavery, abolished in 1834, was followed by a 4-year apprenticeship
period where free men continued to work a 45-hour week without
pay in exchange for living in tiny huts provided by the plantation
owners.
One crop has dominated the story of Barbados’ development …
Can you guess what it is?
IT’S SUGARCANE!
Sugarcane was the backbone of the Barbadian economy for centuries.
Even today, it dominates approximately 25% of the landscape.
Sugarcane was introduced to the island by the early settlers and
provided Britain with sugar, rum and molasses.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
The majority of plantations grew sugarcane and were operated
by slave labour.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
By the mid-seventeenth century, Barbados had become both a
leading participant in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and one of
the most profitable European colonies in the world.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
All of the plantations, which were in the main owned in Britain and
operated by slave labour, grew sugar cane and most of them had
their own mill for grinding the cane, extracting the juice and
processing it.
Until recently, the European Union provided support to the
Barbados sugar industry, but since July 2006, in an attempt to
protect its own sugarbeet industry, the subsidies have been
steadily reduced.
© European Community, 2007
Increased competition and pressure to reduce preferential trade
agreements has seen the Barbados sugar industry decline.
In 1950, the sugar industry employed
By 1999 it was employing only
30,000
3,000
.
people.
Photograph: Chris Hoyle
This represented
56%
of employment
in the agricultural sector …
and around
3%
of the national workforce.
Photograph: Chris Hoyle
One of the major changes in the sugar industry over the years has
been the move from being labour intensive ...
... to full mechanisation.
In the past cane was harvested manually.
From the collection of the Barbados Museum & Historical Society
Men and women would cut the tall stalks, pile them into bundles to be
loaded on to trucks and carts to be taken to the factories.
Today, 90% of the crop is harvested mechanically.
Photographer: Neville O. Badenock
Copyright holder: Ibo Inc. 2006
Rationalisation of the industry has seen the number of factories
on the island reduced from 26 at its height to 2 today.
There’s Andrews in St. Joseph …
Photograph: Michelle Nihell
… and Portvale in St. James.
As a result ....
… a system of transporting cane from all parts of the island has been set
up using a number of trans-loading stations serving as collecting points.
Two former factories, Carrington in St. Philip and Bulkeley in St.
George have been utilised for this purpose and it's from these two
points that the canes are then loaded onto large trucks to be taken
to Andrews and Portvale.
Photographer: Neville O. Badenock, Copyright holder: Ibo Inc. 2006
Today, due to problems facing it, the Barbados sugarcane industry
is considering diversifying the growing of cane for purposes other
than sugar production:
Firstly, through making board to be used in the construction industry.
And secondly by generating power through burning cane.
The Barbadian Sugar Industry has also attempted to carve
niche markets in which it can sell premium sugar.
Plantation Reserve, is one such product,
which has recently reached UK supermarket shelves.
So next time you visit Barbados, read about it or see it on television …
Photographer: Keith H. Clark
… pause and consider the role of sugar and slavery on the island.
Photographer: Neville O. Badenock
Copyright holder: Ibo Inc. 2006
Barbados: Sugar and Slavery