The Germans have done no development themselves for the production of raw material, but the European plantations are huge farms in the lower-lying country; and though on the slopes of Kilima 'Njaro there are small holders, these are in the main Englishmen, Greeks, or British Indians.
The Germans did not grant a full title to land, and intending planters had to buy their land from natives and run the risk that their titles might not be recognised, as the natives' claim to land had not yet been adjudicated--which means, of course, that, as elsewhere, the land had been "confiscated"; though it did not suit German policy immediately to take it out of the hands of the natives.
The products grown on the European plantations by what has passed from actual to semi-slave labour, are principally coffee, rubber, cotton, and sisal hemp. The European products were heavily subsidised.
The natives contribute from the natural resources of the country grain, medicinal herbs, copal, beeswax, hides, wild coffee, wild rubber, palm-oil, copra, and dairy products. They have been encouraged in every way to increase their production of raw materials by brutality and terrorism, which almost depopulated the Ruanda country, and by instruction in the methods of growing and collecting.
A translation in the journal of the African Society quotes Hans Zache in "Dressig jahre Deutsch-Ost-Africa" (Thirty years of German East Africa): "It is a falsely reasoned and falsely proved humanitarianism which seeks to take no cognisance of the education of the native _for manual work_. Work is provided by the European planters so that the Colony may benefit by increased production, and not least also is it provided for the blessing of the negro."
The blessing is not altogether so apparent to the negro, regarded in conjunction with the fruit of his labour--usually dishonourable stripes.
The European plantations are in the hands of 758 planters, and cover an area of about 250,000 acres--of which 80,000 were planted with rubber, 50,000 with sisal, and 35,000 with cotton; while 1,000,000 cocoa-nut trees were also put in.
Ivory, which for years was the chief article of export, has given place to sisal; and in 1913 the value of sisal hemp exported approached £500,000, rubber taking second place with £325,000.