Dr Rita Pemberton
The historical experience of Tobago’s cocoa industry differs from that in Trinidad.
Cocoa cultivation in Trinidad was facilitated by Governor Gordon’s Crown land policy, which aimed to deal with a major squatting problem during the post-emancipation period. Gordon reduced the price of state land to £1 per acre for a minimum of five acres and significantly simplified the land sale process.
The scheme was first implemented in the Montserrat area and included in the first purchasers were Spanish peons, residual First People population who as traditional users, had experience in the cultivation of cocoa, freed Africans and immigrants from other Caribbean islands. These small landholders engaged in cocoa cultivation which was established as a small operator's crop with only a few large estates becoming involved in the business.
Between 1840 and 1866, the cocoa industry was initially mildly prosperous after which, propelled by Cadbury's interest and the growth of US demand, a boom occurred and the demand for Trinidad’s flavouring cocoa soared. The fortunes of the cocoa industry were further enhanced by the depression in the sugar industry which until then was the island’s major export crop. The decline of the sugar industry facilitated increased availability of land, labour and financial resources to the cocoa industry which simulated boom conditions in 1870 and by the end of the century, cocoa outstripped sugar as the island’s dominant export crop.
Between the 1840s and 1920, after Venezuela and Ecuador, Trinidad was the third largest producer of cocoa in the world. This crop dominated the island’s economy from 1866 to 1920, and its production remained primarily in the hands of the small operators.
However, after 1920 when Trinidad’s production peaked at 75 million pounds, there was a decline in world demand and overproduction which was caused by increased production in West Africa, causing a drastic fall in cocoa prices on the international market. In addition, prices were further negatively affected by the Great Depression of the 1920s while the incidence of Witches Broom disease reduced production levels. At the same time, there occurred an increase in world sugar prices which re-invigorated the sugar industry and the growth of the oil industry which created competition for labour and offered wages that the cocoa industry could not match. Hence, from the1930s as the Trinidad cocoa industry struggled, efforts were made to strengthen the industry with the formation of a Cocoa Board in 1945 and attempts to rehabilitate the industry to reverse the decline in production which occurred between 1969 and 1986.
While the Trinidad cocoa industry was enjoying boom years the Tobago cocoa industry was being encouraged. As a possible export crop, cocoa production was introduced to Tobago after the crash of the sugar industry in 1884. The demise of the sugar industry left several abandoned estates which were subdivided and sold to the freed African population thereby establishing a landed peasantry
