Alcohol and Drugs History Society

Nigeria's cocoa trees are ageing and so are its farmers

The cocoa industry in Nigeria is in trouble in part because young people don't want to be cocoa farmers. Another oddity: unlike nearby African countries, Nigeria produces no chocolate. For more, see here.

Nigeria overtakes Ireland in Guinness sales

Nigeria has overtaken Ireland as the second-largest market for Guinness as Diageo pushes the black stuff internationally.

The Guardian reports.

Gin in colonial Nigeria (article)

Chima J. Korieh, "Alcohol and Empire: 'Illicit' Gin Prohibiion and Control in Colonial Eastern Nigeria," Journal of African Economic History 31 (2003): 111-134.

Alcoholism in Third-World Literature (article)

Bazin, Nancy Topping. “Alcoholism in Third-World Literature: Buchi Emecheta, Athol Fugard, and Anita Desai.” In Jane Lilienfeld and Jeffrey Oxford, eds., The Languages of Addiction (New York: St. Martin’s, 1999), 123-132. [Nigerian literature.]

Prohibition as Colonial Policy in Northern Nigeria (article)

Olukoju, Ayodeji. “Race and Access to Liquor: Prohibition as Colonial Policy in Northern Nigeria, 1919-45.” The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History 24:2 (1996), 218-243.

Alcohol and the Slave Trade in West Africa, 1400-1850

Charles Ambler, “Alcohol and the Slave Trade in West Africa, 1400-1850.” Drugs, labor, and colonial expansion. Ed. William Jankowiak and Daniel Bradburd. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2003, pp. 73 - 88.

Drug cartels using African connections

CNN reports (27 July 2005) from Dakar, Senegal that South American drug cartels are moving their logistics bases to West Africa, lured by lax policing in an unstable region and the presence of small, underground criminal groups, United Nations experts say. Drug cartels are increasingly using West Africa as a hub for smuggling, working with criminal networks from the region who market cannabis, cocaine and heroin in Europe and North America, according to the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Read more here.

Delhi police bust drug trafficking racket

NDTV.com reports (1 May 2005) that the Delhi police's year-long search paid off on Saturday when they arrested Nigerian national Emmanuel Chikezietics from the capital's Nizamuddin area. Chikezietics was long suspected to be part of a drug smuggling racket, and was arrested when he was trying to sell 25 grams of cocaine worth Rs 1.5 lakh to a Kashmiri businessman Imtiaz Peer. Peer, also a suspected drug trafficker, used his handicrafts shops in the capital to sell drugs. Find the full story here.

Nigerian breweries closing

Vanguard (Lagos) reports (20 April 2005) that authorities of the Nigerian Breweries Plc met on April 21 with officials of the Abia State government to brief them on the reasons behind the recent closure of the company's brewery in Aba and the subsequent laying off of the workers. The workers were taken aback early this month when information filtered in that the management had decided to close the brewery which is one of the highest employers of labour in the commercial city. Find the full story here.

Cocoa in Nigeria (Dissertation)

Ezekial Ayodele Walker, "The Rise and Decline of Cocoa Production in Southwestern Nigeria from 1900 to 1993" (Ph.D. dissertation, Michigan State University, 1999).