4.
56
Colonial Development.
In any study of the conditions of the British Colonies it
would be foolish to consider only their remaining, self-evident
needs. Any impartial review of the situation will demonstrate
some wonderful achievements of which the British people may
justifiably be proud.
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Little more than a generation ago West Africa was known as
"the white man's grave. The first task of British Colonial
officers there, as elsewhere, was to improve the conditions of general health. In their efforts to do this many pioneers lost
their lives, but their efforts led to success. In 1903 the annual
death rate of British officials in West frica was 20.6 per 1,000;
by 1935 it had been reduced to 5.1. And the health of the natives
was correspondingly improved.
The British New roads are being built in almost every colony.
Government is providing for aerodromes in Nigeria, sponge fisheries
in the Bahamas, beaver farms in Newfoundland, the cassava industry
in Bechuanaland, and a telephone system in Swaziland.
Areas which
-
were unexplored, the scenes of ruthless tribal wars and all the
evils of slavery only fifty years ago, are now settled, healthy,
and well-administered territories. Immense tracts of swamp, the
home of the tsetse fly, the carrier of sleeping-sickness, have
been cleared, so that now the general infection rate is less than
a quarter of what it was formerly.
Indeed, the success of the British campaign against disease
Enormous numbers of
in tropical Africa has raised new problems. natives who would have died under the old conditions are now kept
alive. Native populations increase more quickly than economic
conditions can be changed to meet their needs in accordance with
our more humanitarian views; but as new problems arise new methods
are devised to cope with them.