Talk:Tanganyika groundnut scheme
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[edit] Vis-à-vis the dispute tag
- The article says, ".. peanuts will not grow in Tanganyika". I doubt this statement. It could be that groundnuts didnt grow in the specific farms or areas where the scheme was attempted, but Tanzania is 945,090 km², with a variety of climatic [1] and agro-ecological zones[2]. A google search tells that groundnuts are being grown, sold and eaten in Tanzania [3].
- The article says that "the project was a brainchild of the British Labour government of Clement Attlee", and that Frank Samuel of United Africa Company/Unilever came up with the idea. That is an equivocal statement. --Ezeu 18:30, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
- Yes, the first part is contradictory compared to the rest of the article
- 1) Peanuts/Groundnuts do grow in Tanzania and locals had cultivated them in that very area. However, they did not grow in such quantities that British could have used them in industrial production. (They also used European methods that may not actually work in Africa).
- 2) Unclear at the very least, yes. As far as I know, Samuel originated the idea and the Labour government adopted, endorsed and organized it. - Skysmith 19:50, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Support the Merge
I've just added a paragraph about the scheme to the Mtwara Region article. Reading the two "Groundnut Scheme" articles, this one is by far the most complete and correct, although both pages fail utterly to even mention the town of Mtwara which was to have been the principal export facility, and was the administrative and commercial base for most of the scheme. BTW, my father was one of the Shell sales reps in the area in the early '50s and had many (only semi-humorous) tales of the absolute incompetence shown by the principals. Yes, it is true that the final killer was the impossibility of harvesting the crop from rock-hard dry clay! Gordon | Talk, 03:32, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
