THE EXPLOITATION OF THE NIGERIAN PEASANT FARMERS BY THE MARKETING BOARD SYSTEM IN NIGERIA IN 1954

Abstract

The establishments of the Commodity Marketing Boards (CMBs) and later Regional Marketing Boards in the British Colonial Empires in the 1940s and the early 1950s were primarily aimed at stabilizing prices of produce for the “benefits” of the local producers against the vagaries of world market prices to enhance the export of these produce. However, to a large extent, these set objectives turned out to undermine the purpose for which the Marketing Boards were established in all the British Colonial Empires. This paper examines the activities of the Regional Marketing Boards (RMBs) that were set up in the four regions of the Nigeria, including Southern Cameroon in 1954. RMBs showcase how the local producers were exploited and denied the benefits of
having a good world market price for their produce that should have accrued to them from the activities of the Boards. The material documents used in support of this finding are largely a product of classified archival materials from the British National Archives in London.