Botswana's Beef Cattle Exports: Establishment of a Reserve Industry c. 1900 - 1924 by Michael Hubbard Introduction During the first ThDdecades of this century, beef cattle became the chief export of the Bechuanaland Protectorate. This oc=red as a result of oolonial oonsolida tion (levying taxes, es tablishing 'native reserves' and 'European' freehold fanning blocks and trading stores) and of the growth of the Johanneswrg market on the one hand, and as a resul t of the decline of earlier exports (hunting products and cpld) on the other. In short, during this period the Protectorate became 'locked in' to a role within southern African aCCUIlU.llation as both a labour reserve and a supplier of cheap meat. '!he beef cattle export industry so established was a 'reserve industry' - its product exported in its crudest fom, its fortunes wholly vulnerable to the vagaries of external events and to nanipulation by opposing interest groups in the SOuth African rreat industry, its own interests unprotected by any effective political power, its fOTIll3.l status 'outside' the state to mich it was effectively subject. Section I discusses the reasons for the rise of the trade and section II the nature of the crisis it faced in the slunp following WOrldWar I, mich led to SOuth African protectionism and the entry of the Irrperial Cold Storage and Supply Co. (ICS) into the Protectorate - the ThDdominant features of the next period in the industry's history, whid1 culminated in its collapse in the mid-1930s. Section III concludes. 1. Cattle supplies were the reason for the earliest European interest in the territory of the Tswana1. But until the late 19th century they were only one of a number of traded cpods and less inportant than hunting products.2 It was the establishrrent and rapid expansion of mining in South Africa from the 1870s, with its urban ooncentrations of mining and industrial v.or- kers of Kimberley and on the Witwatersrand, whid1 created a demandfor cheap sources of protein - with rreat being a llOst convenient form given its al::m1dance,acceptability and ease of transport on the hoof. '!he trade from north of the M:llopobefore 1900 was probably small, inter- mittent and oonfined to breeding and draught stock for farT.tingareas in the Cape and Transvaal lying closer to the still small mines and towns.3 M:lreover the Rinderpest epidemic of 1896 and Boer war of 1899-1902must have been severe disruptions; they also resulted in substantial inpOrts of meat from Australia and South Arrerica. A number of factors underlie the rise of cattle exports fran the Bechuana- land Protectorate during the first twenty years of the new century. First- ly the expansion of the mines; seo:lIldly the location of SOuth Africa's cattle production; thirdly the nature of the meat demandedfor the labour conpounds; fourthly oolonial oonsolidation in the protectorate. 47 The rein roncen tra tions of ca ttle in SOU th Africa were si tua ted retOtely from the expanding Ni twa tersrand behind the eas tern escarpnmt in Zululand, Natal and fue Transvaal. 4 They were also rrore prone to tropical ca ttle diseases (particularly East Coast fever) t:h.;m cattle on the highve1d. By a:nparison Sou them Rhodesia and Bechuanaland Protec tora te were well si tua- ted to supply the Nitwatersrand. The na 1llre of the =ke t also favoured drawing supplies of cattle from 'native reserves' (of 1f.hich the Protectorate largely ronsis ted): fue mine and indus trial ronpounds demanded cheap ~ t arove all and the reserves (owing to their nurrerous cattle5, lack oj al teL'- nati ve =ke ts and absence of land rent) were the cheapes t source. With !reat supplies being drawn from increasing dis tances to the Witwatersrand specialised intermediaries (dealers and speculators) emerged to organise the wying of lives tock, linking to ccmnission agen ts at the rein =ke ts. These ronmission agen ts saw to the transactions wi fu wyers and provided the dealers and specula tors wi th finance for lives 1:ock. wying6. Cold storage facilities a t the main centres became an irrpor tan t link in the =ke ting chain. Owingmainly perhaps to the economies of sale in rold storage it was here tha t the larges t agglanera tion of capi tal in the meat industry was centred. Briefly, by 1905 the Inperial Cold Storage and Supply Corrpanyhad energed as the daninant force in SOU th African meat 1f.holesaling, forired through a merger of De Beers Cold Storage and Canbrink and Corrpany1f.hichhad held the meat irrport supply rontracts for the British troops during the Boer war. 7 While the rourgeoning export =ket \\QuId 00 doubt have given rise to African entrepreneurship in the protec tora te' s cattle trade8 it occurred at the SaIre tiIre as the consolida tion of colonial adminis tra tion in the terri- tory, which fawured fue formation of a pred:lminantiy 1f.hite-owned trading systen. The concession of white farming 'blocks' in the early 1900s brought settlers. Best asserts that they "were ranchers first and traders second, w t they quickly realised the close rela tionship of the t'MJ pursui ts. They wilt up their herds with African livestock exchanged for clothing, hardware and other general merchandise"9. Nhatever the settlers' priority may have been, a neoork of mainly European-owned trading stores arose 1f.hichlinked in easily with the high veld cattle wying chain drawing finance from agents and dealers on the Witwatersrand. White traders also enjoyed the f~vour of the Government in excluding rofu Asians and Africans from c:om:nerce.0 In the reserves traders were allocated, or were rented, grazing rights by the chiefs and trekked cattle out - either directly for export (by rail or on the hoof) or first to the 1f.hite farming 'blocks' for holding or growing out. Cat tie trading and holding becaIre and renained for the next half cen tury , the l:asic opera tion of these 'blocks' (henceforfu referred to as the free- hold farms as they are COIlIrOnly koown, al though Ghanzi was leasehold until the late 1950s)11. "The life of the native does, it is true, still offer li ttle scope for European enterprise apart from the operations of traders" renarked Pim12. Inp:lsi tion fran 1899 of the 'Native taxes' (payable in cash), to pay the costs of rolonial administration, provided an illportant in- centive to cattle owners to sell. Three major geographical carponents of the cattle trade in the Protectorate began to emerge. Firstly, the wlk of the trade enanated fran the Ngwato reserve - the largest reserve, containing the most people, some two-thirds of the cattle population and the largest herds 13 - forming the hub of the export trade to the south, with the cattle exported directly or held in the Tati, Tuli and Gaberones blocks. Serondly, a trade fran Ngarniland to the Katanga mines began fran 1914 owing to a disastrous epidEmic of rovine 4K pl~eul\l:mia in Bam tseland from m~e the mines' meat supplies haQ previously been drawn)4 '!hough uneven and intenni. tten t this trade 10 the COpperbelt was 10 ranain the nain market for Ngamiland cattle until 1967. '!he third CJCIlIlOnentcentred on the G1anzi fanns in the western Kgalagadi, b.1ying imnature stock from Ngamiland and the surrounding Kgalagadi villages and trekking then sou th. 15 The rise of the cattle ~rt trade coincided with the gradual decline of other connodity eJqXlrts, principally hunting products and cpld from the Tati.16 Although in a cpod rainfall year grain eJqXlrts could be substantial (e.g. E 21,000 in 1909)17 they were intennittent and increasingly less frequent. Cattle eJqXlrts escalated unevenly. Between 1905 and 1910 they were fairly stagnant (averaging a1:out 3000 head per annumaccording 10 official figures, though unrecorded ~rts might have been I1U.lch higher). Superfi- cially this reflp.cted the appearance of tovi.ne pleuro-pnamonia (""lung sick- ness') in the Protectorate with resulting South African inport restric- tions. But Pim noted that an earlier outbreak of East Coast fever" ••• not in the Protectorate itself b.1t in the adjacent areas of Rhodesia and the Transvaal, had already led to the inposition of restrictions on ~rts to the Cape Colony, then the best market, and the appearance of lung sickness (in 1905) led to these restrictions being intensified. Following on the Act of Union in 1909 the restrictions were extended to the other three provinces. 18 coinciden tally, the 1905 - 10 period seans to ha\\~ Leen one of slack dauand and doirestic oversupply at meat in South Afric". 19 Thus this episode nay be the first instance of wha t was to becane a recur- ring pattern of veterinary restrictions against inports being inposed or tightened by South Africa M1enever d;;lmestic prices ~ened. EJIPOrts were bJosted after 1910 toth by the recovered South African market and by the opening of the Johannesburg municipal abattoirs in 1910 with their adjoining quarantine market.20 This" •••• enabled, for the first time, farmers from the ruffer and quarantine areas, and the surrounding countries of RhodeSia, Bechuanaland, Swaziland and SOuth West Africa, to forward the:ir st:od< in sealed trucks for sale on the Johannesburg markets, 1.I.hichwere otherwise closed to them,,21. The Johannesl.:urg quarantine market was to provide the nain official outlet for Bechuanalari.dcattle sales until mid-century. Cattle sent to the quarantine market had to be sold and slaughtered imnediately, with the meat passing directly to the consumers; Le. it was forbidden from entering the retail trade. Whatever veterinary grounds nay have llDtivated these restrictions they caused quarantine market meat to re sold at a discount below the open market price by preventing the "quarantine cattle" from being held over M1enprices were low and by limi ting l:uyers to thJse 1.o.holesalers \J1o could dispose of it quicklY and directly to consumers; in effect, this meant the few 1.o.holesalersoolding sup- ply contracts for mine, industrial and other institutional cx:npounds. EJIPOrt '-Olumefrom Bechuanaland increased substantially to over 12 000 head per annumand the Protectorate CPverI"llleIltnoted in 1914 that cattle expgrts to Johannesturg had beoorre "by far the principal eJCPOrtof the country"22 The rise of the eJCPOrttrade had brought with it the need for regulation of veterinary COnditions, stock theft and fraud. The Veterinary services Department was started in 1905, cattle brands were registered and penalties fixed for stock theft (Proclamation 7 of 1907). Cattle b.1yers for ~rt 49 were obliged to take out expensive licences (£100 deposit), since" it was felt that the natives required protection against possibly unscrupulous or fraudulent dealing on the part of some of than wh;) were merely birds of passage with no stake or interests in the oountry, and \oA1o in the eventaf proceedings being instituted against than w:mld probably disappear as sud- denlyas they I'.ad cane"13 (Proc. 39 of 1911). This measure also had the effect, intentional or rot, of confining cattle exporting to larger dealers. '!he Bechuanaland Protectorate lis- tic tx'Sition in meat molesaling and retailing at a tiJre of steeply falling 51 prices. Within ICS itself J.G. Van der Horst (architect of the catpany's post-1911 reconstIuction) was ousted as rranaging director by Sir David Graaf in 1921 - an associate of Jan snuts and a rran with the ambitions of Rhodes. Graaf l:esurce:1control of the rotpany at a time when its popula" rity was as low as its market control was high. Such unpopularity, argued the Board of Trade and Industry in 1925, ...... Il'ay in general be attributed to the d1equered career and, at times, singular rrethods of cold storage enterprise. In the trade there have been too rrany conrnercial adventures, too many c:x:xnbines,over-capi talisa tion, too rrany recons tructions , too rrany attellpts at market control, and too great use of political influence." (p.10). secondly, the different strategies ad::>ptedby white fanners' organisations, ICS and the State reflected this conflict. Farmers' Reactions: South African white cattle farmers' reactions to the crisis were threefold. (a) Agitation for embargo of cattle inports, fran Southern Rhodesia and Bechuanaland Protectorate, was the IlOst concerted response of fanners' associations from 1922 to 1924.33 (b) Agitation for reg.J.lation of IlOropolistic activities of middlemen (specifically the ICS), alleged to be manipulating the trade to the disadvantage of farmers. 34 (c) Initiation of cooperative nerketing agencies designed to secure a better return for the forner. '!he Meat Producers' Exchange was fomed in Johannesu.u-g in 1921 with the object of stabilising prices and eli- minating unnecessary middlemen fran the meat trade.35 The Farmers Cooperative Meat Industries Ltd (FOlI), fomed at abcut the same time, had similar ambitions for Natal. Of these three reactions to the crisis by white beef farmers the first was to achieve the IlOst imnediate success - espedally after dissatisfied white farmers and industrial \-.Orkers (following the 'Rand re\o!t' of 1922) had replaced the South African party goverrurent of J.C. Snults with the National- ist - Lal::x:>ur coalition under J.B.M. Herzog in 1924. SllUt's party was seen as representing 'big rosiness,' and one political c~ge made was that Smlts had nale special concessions to favour the ICS; '!he new government IlOvedquickly to raise the rather tokeninport restrictions inposed by its predecessor and ini tia ted a period of severe agricul tural protectionism which was to endure until World War II. At the same time (October 1924) the new government ordered a full cx;mnission of enquiry3? by the Board of Trade and Industries into the affairs of the ICS and meat marketing in South Africa. The recorrmendations of the ccmnis- sian (unified cooperative societies controlling cold storage facilities in all Ilajor urban areas, under a statutory roard of control) foreshad:Jwed even events of the mid-1930s, wt were not :imnedi.ately acted upon. '!he third reaction by famers (attenpting to fonn independent marketing c0- operatives) was a total failure - owing to misn>anagementand intervention by the ICS. ICS's Reactions: '!he reaction of ICS and its associated catpanies to the Il'arket collapse was also threefold. 52 NOtes 1. '!he earliest rerorded visit is that of the Comnissioners Triirer and 5anerville "wh:) had been sent to the interior by the Covernemnt of the Cape rolony to procure draught oxen to replace local stocks depleted by drought." A. Sillery "Botswana: A Short Political History, p.1 2. N. Parsons "'!he EcoOClllicHistory of Kharta' s country in Botswana 1844- 1930" p.118. In Palmer, R. and Parsons, N. (eds.) The Roots of Rural Poverty in Central and Southern Africa. Heinemann 1979. 3. '!he trade of the Rolong with the Ovarnl:ois one of the earliest docu- nented cases of long distance cattle trading in the region. "BebYeen 1885 and 1895 regular trading caravans backed by the chief nen of the Rolong reserves set out .••• across the desert with horses, saddlery, clothing and firearms to exchange for Ovarnl:o cattle" (Shillington 1981: 278). '!his trade across the Kgalagadi through Lehututu still took place in the early 20th century (Stals 1962 : 75-76). 4. Official Yearbook of the Union of South Africa. No.8 1925. Union Office of Census and Statistics. Map of cattle distribution in South Africa 1925. 5. By the 1920s Africans owned al:out half of South Africa's nine million cattle, despite being confined officially to only 13%of the land (Union Statistics for 50 years" Table 1.4). Much\\hite-owned land was at the time occupied by African "squatters" and etployees. 6. R rt of the COnlnission of i into Abattoirs and Related Faci ities. Governnent Printer, Pretoria, 1964, p. O. 7. These firms ha1 even g::me to the lengths of purchasing an Argentinian frigorifico to supply SOuth African irIports: "La Plata," the subsequent sale of \\hich to the U.S. finn Swift and Co. is of historical signi- ficance since it signalled the entry of U.S. finns into the Argentine- UKmeat trade. Hanson "Argentine Meat and the British Market," Stanford, 1938 Ch.V and S.A. Board of Trade and Industries "Meat, Fish and Other Fcodstuffs. An Enquiry into trade canbinatillns, supplies, distribltion and prices." Report No.54, 1925, provide material on the early history of the Dtperial Cold Storage and Supply Co. 8. As it had earlier in the case of the Rolong Cattle traders (see note 3 al:x:Jve.) 9. A. Bes t, "General 'I'rading in Botswana 1890-1968", EcoOClllicGeograph:i' Octor:er 1970, p.601. 10. I1;4.d. Best discusses discrimination against Asian and African awli- cants for trading licences. 11. '!his was still the case in the 1940s. "Facts tend to SOClw that the majority of European fanners still give IlOre attention to acquiring livestock for eJq;XJrtthan to rearing livestock. '!his has been the case for sane years past and there seens little OOubt that the fantling of smaller fanns today provides insufficient incnne and consequently the exchange of purchase of livestoc1{ with the native carm.m1ty constitutes the mainstay of European cattle fanning c.perations in this ooontry" (SOurce: Annual Ri!port of the Department of Veterinaxy S~, Wldated but fram period 1940-47. BNA.5.261/9/1). 54 12. A. Pim. Report 13. I am grateful to Mr Tom Kays of Maun (whostarted fanning and trading in Chanzi in 1912) for this information on the early Chanzi trade. See also M. Russell and M. Russell "Afrikaners of the Kalahari: White Minority in a Black State." Cambridge 1979. 14. Van Horn, L. "'!he Agricultural History of Barotseland" in Palmer, R. and Parsons, N. (eds.) 15. The Roots of Rural Poverty in Central and Southern Africa, Lonoon, 1977. 16. Cold exports were as IlUch as £56 000 v.orth in 1909 wt were on a declining trend thereafter. Colonial Annual Reports, Bechuanaland Protectorate. 17. Ibid 18. Pim, op.cit. 14. 19. As reflected in the poor profits made by ICS in this period, which were also partly due to tenporarily sharp OOIlpetition (S.A. Board of Trade and Industries, Report No.54 1925 p. 7). 20. Meat slaughtering and handling ronditions in Johanneswrg prior to the opening of the nunicipal abattoir were primitive ronsisting of " •••. a number of insanitary and filthy ramshackle v.ood and iron slaughter poles ••• dotted around the city." With the advent of the abattoir" .••• all the old slaughter poles were closed down" and a by-products plant was opened - ronverting waste material into c:x.mner- cial fats, fertilizers and other fann foods. Source: Col. 1. Smith "Transfonning a City's meat industry: the growth of the Johanneswrg Livestock market" in "Municipal Magazine" Johanneswrg 1938. 21. ~ 22. Colonial Annual Report for Bechuanaland Protectorate, 1913-1914, p.6 23. Ibid 24. ~ 25. "Native taxes" totalled 25s per adult male per annumin 1923. These taxes provided allrost half of the B.P. c:Pvernmentdanestic revenue in the early 1920s. 26. "Official Yearbook of the Union of South Africa" No.8 1925 page 1063. Even so the Union did suspend briefly iIrports other than for inmediate slaughter in March 1919 owing to a feared southward spread of "lung- sickness" (Res. Magistrate to Chief Linchwe, 20 March 1919. Lindlwe I papers, Phutadikobo Museum,MJehudi). 27. Figure for 1916/17 fran Colonial Annual Report for Bed1uanaland Protectorate 1916-17; figure for 1920/21 from BNAS.274/1. 55 28. Report of the carmission of Enquiry into Abattoirs and Related Facili ties, Governrrent Printer, Pretoria, 1964. Para 43. 29. The h.1lk of beef narketed in SOuth Africa at the time carne fran retired trek oxen and was therefore lean, hence low-grade. See Board of Trade and Industries, Report No.54 1925, p.38, and Cape Times Editorial 19th August 1924: ''I-/hat is chiefly wrong with our cattle trade is rot that it suffers fran unfair c:orrpetition h1 t that it produces so much bad beef. It will never get g:xx1 (export) markets until it grows be tter beef." 30. Official Yearl:ook of the Union of SOuth Africa. No.8 1925, p.1063 31. "Union Statistics for Fif1¥ Years" Table H9. 32. S.A. Board of Trade and Inc1ustries, Report No.54, '19~5 pp. 7-8 33. Reports of farmers meetings, ca~ Times 18/8/22, 23/3/23. I Rand Daily Mail 22/8/24, Star 19/ /24. 34. Rand Daily Mail 22/8/24 35. S.A. Board of Trade and Industries. Report No.54 page 10. 36. Parliarrentary debate, reported in Cape Times 19/8/24 37. S.A. Board of Trade and Industries. Report No.54 page 10. 38. Van Biljon, F. State Interference in South Africa, Lonron 1938 39. ~., page 41. 40. Ibid., page 42. 41. Italy became the rrajor market for SOuthern African beef exports until U.K. rrarket quotas for chilled beef were obtained by the Ottawa concessions of 1932. 42. SOuth African t:ounties were payable on e:xports fran South t'iest Africa, and 5a.1 th Africa had reached agreeren t with the British High Carroissioner tha t t:ounties paid on ca tile slaughtered for overseas export originating in the High Comnission territories (Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland) were recoverable from the territorial govern- ments. A similar arranganen t seffilS to have €Xis bed wi th SOuthern Rhodesia. BNAFile S.18/4. The t:ounties were payablt> even on lean third grade meat. 43. Parliarrentary debate. Cape Times 18/8/24, and Board of Trade and Industries, Report No.54 Page 47. 44. Statement by Graaff to the Board of Trade and Industries enq:uiry. Report No.54 page 11. The support of the mining CCJlpanieswas crucial owing to the rragnitude of their meat requiranents. 56 45. Union of S.A. "Findings of the Board of Control in an Enquiry into the Meat Trade." UG 21 of 1922 p.6 46. Cape Times 18/8/22 47. Board of Trade and Industries, Report No.54 page 13. 'Ihe manner of take-over of FCMIrepeated ICS's much earlier experience with tile for- merly state-owned Transvaal Koelkamers Beperkt. Ibid page 15. 48. Petition prepared by Isang Pilane, Chief of the BakgaUa, to be presented to Prince Arthur of Connaught on the occasion of the opening of r-t:x::hudiNational School in August 1923. (SOurce: Isang Pilane papers, Phutadikobo Museum,~hudi. I am grateful to Sandy Grant for bringing this petition to my attention). 57 58