CLIMATE AND THE SLAVE TRADE JAMES FENSKEy AND NAMRATA KALA? ABSTRACT. African societies exported more slaves in colder years. Lower temperatures reduced mortality and raised agricultural yields, lowering slave supply costs. Our results help explain African participation in the slave trade, which predicts adverse outcomes today. We use an annual panel of African temperatures and port-level slave exports to show that exports declined when local temperatures were warmer than normal. This result is strongest where African ecosystems are least resilient to climate change. Cold weather shocks at the peak of the slave trade predict lower economic activity today. We support our interpretation using the histories of Whydah, Benguela, and Mozambique. 1. INTRODUCTION One of the key mechanisms through which geography affects modern development is its influence on historical events. Many of the deep roots of economic development have been shaped by the environment, including the timing of the adoption of agri- culture (Ashraf and Michalopoulos, 2014), ethnic diversity (Michalopoulos, 2012), and the nature of ethnic institutions (Alsan, 2014). As Nunn (2014) points out, “[t]he im- pacts of geography depend crucially on the particular historical context.” The intersec- tions of the disease environment with the process of European colonization (Acemoglu et al., 2001), droughts with the course of the Mexican revolution (Dell, 2012), and terrain ruggedness with Africa’s slave trades (Nunn and Puga, 2012) are all examples of how the environment has shaped present-day outcomes because it has mattered at specific yUNIVERSITY OF OXFORD ?YALE UNIVERSITY E-mail addresses:
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