“Food Comes First”: The Development of Colonial Nutritional Policy in Ghana, 1900–1950

ABSTRACT

This article examines the origins of colonial-era nutrition policy in Ghana (the colonial Gold Coast). It shows how imperial ideas about food and nutrition evolved in response to changing conditions in Ghana, as well as in response to new ideas originating outside Africa. British officials initially assumed food was abundant, identifying a growing taste for imports among urban elites as a key problem. By the early 1920s, new personnel with new priorities began to investigate local foodways, laying the groundwork for policies emphasizing nutrition, food production, and domestic education that were often continued into the post-colonial period.

KEYWORDS:

• Food history
• nutrition
• malnutrition
• colonialism
• Ghana

Acknowledgments

Part of the research for this article was supported by the Cornell University College of Human Ecology, through the Dean’s Fellowship in the History of Home Economics. My research in Ghana would not have been possible without the help of my colleague Beatrice Quarshie Smith and the staff at the Accra branch of Ghana’s Public Records and Archives Administration. Attendees at the 2015 Britain and the World conference and the 2016 Midwest Conference on British Studies provided valuable feedback on earlier drafts of this article, and I thank the journal’s anonymous reviewers for their detailed critique of the finished manuscript.

Notes

1. Miller, “Food and Nationalism,” 1; Robertson, Sharing the Same Bowl, 38.

2. Clark, Onions Are My Husband, chap. 10; Robertson, “Death of Makola.”

3. Raschke and Cheema, “Colonisation”; see also Patel, “Food Sovereignty.”

4. “L’impérialisme, regardez dans votre assiette ….” Quoted in “L’Histoire n’est pas finie … Thomas Sankara, le sardon africain,” http://thomassankara.net/lhistoire-nest-pas-finie-thomas-sankara-le-sardon-africain/, accessed 14 February 2018.

5. Worboys, “Colonial Malnutrition”; Arnold, “Colonial India.”

6. Destombes, “Nutrition and Economic Destitution.”

7. Gocking, History of Ghana. “Gold Coast” is used below to describe all of colonial Ghana; “Gold Coast Colony” is reserved for the southern administrative unit, roughly equivalent to the Western, Central, and Eastern, and Greater Accra regions of Ghana today.

8. See Torto, “Securing the Northern Region,” chap. 3.

9. Worboys, “Colonial Malnutrition.”

10. La Fleur, Fusion Foodways; see also McCann, Stirring the Pot, chap. 5.

11. Rönnbäck, Labour and Living Standards; Kea, Settlements, Trade, and Politics.

12. Reynolds, Trade and Economic Change; Sanders, “Palm Oil Production.”

13. Robertson, Sharing the Same Bowl, 26; for inequality and food access, see La Fleur, Fusion Foodways, 136–52.

14. La Fleur, Fusion Foodways, 137–44.

15. Ibid., 193.

16. Quoted in Gale, “Struggle against Disease,” 185.

17. Gold Coast Government, Annual Report 1905, 49.

18. Masefield, Handbook of Tropical Agriculture, 3; Curtin, Image of Africa. As Helen Tilley put it, “the luxurious foliage [of tropical Africa] rested on fragile foundations.” Africa as a Living Laboratory, 154.

19. Blue book, 1867, 196, ADM 7/1/5, Public Records and Archives Administration of Ghana, Accra Branch (PRAAD-Accra hereafter); see also W.F. Hutchinson, “Report of the Commission on Economic Agriculture in the Gold Coast,” 1889, MS in ADM 5/37, PRAAD-Accra.

20. Summary of 1891 Gold Coast Census, ADM 5/2/1, PRAAD-Accra.

21. See for example Rich, Workman Is Worthy, 23, 29–31; Getz, Slavery and Reform.

22. Vernon, Hunger; cf. Rönnbäck, “Idle and the Industrious.”

23. Field, “Gold Coast Food,” 11. The “heaviness” of foods like fufu is valued by West Africans, who preferred the sensation of “fullness” these foods gave, which signals the completion of a good meal. See Osseo-Asare, “We Eat First With Our Eyes”; Osseo-Asare, Food Culture.

24. McPhee, Economic Revolution, 9.

25. Robins, “Colonial Cuisine,” 462–63.

26. Colonial Office, West African Pocket Book, 28; British Red Cross Society, Gold Coast Council Branch, Gold Coast Cookery; Larymore, Resident’s Wife, 213; Sister Cockburn, Practical Guide; Leith-Ross and Ruxton, Practical West African Cookery.

27. For example Williamson, Gold Coast Diaries, 336; see also Shaffer, “Seasonal Poverty”; Destombes, “Seasonal Hunger.”

28. “Report on 1911 Census,” Gold Coast Government, ADM 5/2/3, PRAAD-Accra.

29. Kea, Settlements, Trade, and Politics, 301; see also Robertson, Sharing the Same Bowl; Parker, Making the Town.

30. Ewusi, “Government Food Policies,” 1–2.

31. Wilk, Home Cooking in the Global Village; Protschky, “Colonial Table”; Robins, “Colonial Cuisine”; Leong-Salobir, “‘Cookie’ and ‘Jungle Boy.’”

32. Gocking, Facing Two Ways; Ray, Crossing the Color Line.

33. Rich, Workman Is Worthy, 87.

34. Gold Coast government, Report on the Census (1921), 83, ADM 5/2/5, PRAAD-Accra.

35. Moyes, “Making of the Everyday,” 101; for a discussion of import dependency, see Freidberg, “French Beans for the Masses.”

36. Grischow, “History of Development,” 164.

37. “Agricultural Mutual Improvement Association,” Gold Coast Nation, April 7, 1917, 5.

38. Gold Coast Nation, July 1914, quoted in Moyes, “Making of the Everyday,” 102.

39. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, “Miscellaneous Notes,” 350.

40. Quoted in Report on the Census (1921), 164.

41. Quoted in Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, “Miscellaneous Notes,” 351.

42. See Zeide, Canned.

43. Field, “Gold Coast Food,” 10.

44. Bowler, Gold Coast Palaver, 12.

45. West African Pocket Book, 29. French officials agreed with this advice; see Neill, “Finding the ‘Ideal Diet,’” 11; Gauducheau, “Alimentation Des Europeens Aux Colonies.”

46. Fragmentary medical report, c. 1920, ADM 5/1/78, PRAAD-Accra.

47. Quoted in Neill, “Finding the ‘Ideal Diet,’” 20.

48. Quoted in Report on the Census (1921), 164.

49. Fragmentary report, c. 1920, ADM 5/1/78, PRAAD-Accra.

50. Guggisberg, “Goal of the Gold Coast,” 82.

51. Coe, “Educating an African Leadership,” 30.

52. “Report by the Hon. W.G.A. Ormsby-Gore, MP, on his visit to West Africa during the year 1926,” 77, ADM 5/3/24, PRAAD-Accra.

53. Smith, “Nutrition Science”; Vernon, Hunger, 89–90; Gratzer, Terrors of the Table, chap. 8.

54. “Report by the Hon. W.G.A. Ormsby-Gore,” 77.

55. Gold Coast Annual Report for 1912, 44.

56. “Report by the Hon. W.G.A. Ormsby-Gore,” 78.

57. For the history of cassava in Ghana, see La Fleur, Fusion Foodways, 155–81.

58. Cardinall, The Gold Coast in 1931, 100.

59. “Report by the Hon. W.G.A. Ormsby-Gore,” 79.

60. Worboys, “Colonial Malnutrition”; Simmons, “Starvation Science.”

61. Coghe, “Reordering Colonial Society”; Coghe, “Population Politics,” 332; see also Bonnecase, “Avoir faim”; Neill, “Finding the ‘Ideal Diet.’”

62. Roubaud, “Rapport Sur La Question.”

63. Worboys, “Colonial Malnutrition.”

64. Hardy, Richet, and Vassal, L’Alimentation Indigène, 9.

65. Worboys, “Colonial Malnutrition,” 223.

66. “The food problems of the British colonial dependencies.”

67. Cheyssial, “Étude de La Ration Alimentaire,” 512, 515; see also Fourshey, “Remedy for Hunger.”

68. See discussion in Hodge, Triumph of the Expert; Hodge, “Colonial Experts”; Tilley, Africa as a Living Laboratory.

69. Green and Hymer, “Cocoa in the Gold Coast,” 313–14.

70. “The food problems of the British colonial dependencies,” F.A. Stockdale, n.d. but ca. 1930s, CO 852/503/11, National Archives of the UK (TNA hereafter).

71. See for example Hinden, Plan for Africa; see discussion in Grischow, “History of Development,” 162.

72. Speech by Mr Rhys before the House of Commons, HC Deb 22 April 1932 vol 264 cc1779–1854.

73. Speech by Mr Sorensen before the House of Commons, HC Deb 02 June 1937 vol 324, cols 1122–1123.

74. Bourret, Road to Independence, 124.

75. Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire, part II (1939), Cd. 6050–6051, 3–39, ADM 5/3/119, PRAAD-Accra; compare with Vernon, Hunger, 136.

76. This argument runs contrary to Jennifer Stanton’s claims that Purcell and other doctors did not pursue “technical fixes” to malnutrition problems. “Listening to the Ga,” 164.

77. Medical Research Council, Medical Research Council, 94.

78. The first report was printed as Diet and Ill-Health. Several drafts of subsequent reports are held under ADM 11/1/1294, PRAAD-Accra, but the files were badly disorganized when I examined them in 2015, and I am unable to provide page numbers for quotations. For further discussion of Purcell’s work, see Patterson, Health in Colonial Ghana, 98–99; Destombes, “Seasonal Hunger”; Shaffer, “Seasonal Hunger.”

79. Gilks and Orr, “Nutritional Condition”; Vernon, Hunger, 106–11.

80. Purcell reports, ADM 11/1/1294. M.J. Field shared this view, writing that the Akim “are under-nourished and physically wretched.” “Manya Krobo Land Affairs,” 1940–1941, CSO 21/22/177, PRAAD-Accra.

81. Purcell report.

82. Ibid.; see also Cheyssial, “Étude de La Ration Alimentaire,” 515.

83. Committee on Nutrition in the Colonial Empire, 3–39.

84. See note 81 above.

85. Ibid.

86. Vernon, Hunger, 88–89.

87. Hansen, “Introduction,” 14.

88. See note 81 above.

89. For an overview of typical gender roles in Africa with regard to food, see Osseo-Asare, Food Culture, 26–28.

90. See note 81 above.

91. On the importance of cooking equipment, see Gold Coast Medical Department and Educational Department, Gold Coast Nutrition, 62–71.

92. See note 81 above.

93. Destombes, “Nutrition and Economic Destitution,” 48–50; Patterson, Health in Colonial Ghana, 22.

94. Quoted in Destombes, “Nutrition and Economic Destitution,” 50; Austin, “Poverty and Development,” 230–31.

95. Vernon, Hunger, 118.

96. Mukherjee, Hungry Bengal.

97. Agricultural Department report for 1951–1952, 11, ADM 5/1/163, PRAAD-Accra.

98. Ibid.

99. But note Grischow’s observation that the North was still marginalized: projects were “tied to the development of mining and cocoa farming in the south, since foodstuffs, meat and a disease-free population were needed to maintain the labour force on the southern mines and cocoa farms.” Grischow, Shaping Tradition, 238. Southern Ghanaians inherited the colonial view of the North as remote and backward. See Allman, “Let Your Fashion Be in Line,” 151–56.

100. Gold Coast Medical Department and Educational Department, Gold Coast Nutrition.

101. Grant, Nutrition and Health, 65; see also Vernon, Hunger, 157.

102. Denzer, “Domestic Science,” 125. The notable exception was baked sweets and cakes, which were popular. For other examples of the impact of food preparation tools on foodways, see Teboh, “Science, Technology and African Women.”

103. Grant, Nutrition and Health, 46. Instant fufu was also available by the 1960s, but is often seen as inferior to hand-pounded fufu. See Osseo-Asare, “We Eat First With Our Eyes,” 49–50; Blay-Brody, “Rx. Pepper Soup,” 64.

104. “Survey of Bread Consumption in Accra,” Sept. 1950, RG 4/1/124. PRAAD-Accra.

105. For rice import substitution, see Gold Coast Government, Agricultural Department Report for 1939, 5, ADM 5/1/101; Purcell report.

106. W.A. Lewis, “Report on industrialisation and the Gold Coast” (1953), ADM 5/3/90, PRAAD-Accra.

107. Bourret, Road to Independence; Ahlman, Living with Nkrumahism, chap. 2.

108. Ghana Economic Survey (1957), 2, ADM 7/6/6.

109. Goody, “Rice‐burning and the Green Revolution.”

110. “Ghana-USSR Cooperation,” RG 4/1/41, PRAAD-Accra.

111. Graham, History of Education, chaps. 9, 11; Ahlman, “Africa’s Kitchen Debate,” 160.

112. Ramaseshan, “Survey of Home Science,” 3.

113. Kathleen Rhodes, memo, ca. 1968, folder 1 box 1, 23-2-2703, Human Ecology Ghana Project, Cornell University Archives (HEGP hereafter).

114. Joanna Appiah, “Bases for Developing a Nutrition Curriculum with Special Reference to Winneba Training College,” ca. 1962, Box 1, folder 1, 23-2-2703, HEGP.

115. Harold Feldman, “A brief Study of Ghanaian families,” March 1963, box 1, folder 3, 23-2-2703, HEGP.

116. For a brief history of the Gold Coast/Ghana agriculture department, see La-Anyane, Ghana Agriculture; for education see Agbodeka, “Education in Ghana”; and for domestic education, Hansen, “Introduction”; Ahlman, “Africa’s Kitchen Debate.”

117. See for example Russell, “Malnutrition in Children”; Colbourne et al., “Medical Survey”; Patterson, Health in Colonial Ghana, 98–104; Stanton, “Listening to the Ga.”

118. Hinden, Plan for Africa, 166.

119. Austin, Labour, Land, and Capital, 55; Moradi, Austin, and Baten, “Heights and Development.”

120. Moradi, Austin, and Baten, “Heights and Development.”

121. Patterson, Health in Colonial Ghana, 104.

122. FAOSTAT.

123. Hinderink and Sterkenburg, “Agricultural Policy and Production in Africa.”

124. Miller, “Food and Nationalism,” 62–63.

125. “West Africa Steams over Jollof Rice War,” BBC News, 26 August 2017, http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-41053424.