Africa, especially the region located in the south of the Sahara, is the poorest territory on the planet. At the end of 1993, 11 African countries were among the 15 poorest countries, even though Africa is one of the richest continents in the world.

The poverty of the African continent is exacerbated by a population explosion. Since the continent is unstable many think Africa is unattractive for capital investments. Despite the vast resources, there is poverty in Africa and the poor depend mainly on agriculture.

Although there are a lot of modern reasons, such as corruption, which has affected development in Africa, the roots of the problem go to the distant past, when Europeans who believed that they were superior and more civilized, needed people with different skin colors to work for them.

From the middle of the XV century, slave markets and the sale of African slaves began. They were used as domestic servants and a great percentage was used in agricultural fields.

After the Europeans destroyed the indigenous population of the New World, slaves from Africa were exported to America. Only a hundred years from the 1680s, through the 1780s from Angola to the Spanish colonies of the West Indies took about a million people.

During the slave trade, peculiar slave routes arose. From Europe to Africa, merchants carried firearms, cold arms, alcoholic beverages, copper, iron products, dishes, and glass baubles.

There they exchanged these cheap things for the lives of African slaves, which were delivered to the American colonies. In turn, in the New World, black slaves were exchanged for colonial goods highly valued in Europe, such as tobacco, sugar, cotton, etc.

This brought huge profits to European traders, especially the English ones. Many cities, such as Manchester, London, Liverpool, Bristol, France Nantes and Rouen, Dutch Amsterdam, and many others, owe their well-being to the slave trade.

Photo: African slaves

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