Long-Distance Trade and States in the Niger Delta

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Abstract
European trade in slaves from at least the seventeenth century, and in palm oil during the nineteenth century, has become established as a crucial factor in the development of states in the Niger Delta. However, there is already a dangerous tendency to see these external factors as the only forces responsible for the creation of states in the area. Oral traditional evidence is marshalled to show that internal long-distance trade with these states as focal points existed before European trade. Internal long-distance trade consisted of (i) a north-to-south axis mainly for the supply to the states of agricultural produce, for which salt and fish were exchanged; and (ii) an east-to-west axis between these states and places as far west as Lagos and the Ijebu country for trade in specialist goods produced in various localities. It is therefore stressed that the discussion of the admittedly great influence of European trade on the internal development of states in the Niger Delta needs to be qualified by an understanding of the prior existence of these states in some form, and of the internal long-distance trade that might have exercised similar great influence in the distant past.
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