The Earth Transformed: An Untold History

by Peter Frankopan

As far as colonial settlers were concerned, therefore, African manpower was the answer to multiple problems. As malaria kicked in, decimating the existing population, the desire for more coerced labourers rose sharply. Buyers were not keen to buy enslaved people from just anywhere, but had strong preferences for acquiring those from malaria-ridden regions in Africa, whose populations had high levels of resistance to the disease. This resulted in what one scholar has called a ‘malaria premium’: higher prices for people most likely to survive infection – and therefore prove to be better ‘investments’. Captives from the Gold Coast were considered robust, strong and little affected by disease, while those from the Niger Delta were thought to be less hardy.