Sugar, the plantation, and the state in Tanzania

This essay examines the relationship between sugar, the plantation, and state-building in modern Tanzania. Whereas scholars have emphasised plantations' export orientation, our analysis highlights their historical role in ensuring staple security for the state. This focus on import substitution, dating back to the colonial period, stemmed from export limitations the international sugar regime imposed on Tanzania and government efforts to promote both sugar and the plantation as symbols and engines of development. Large-scale sugarcane production expanded rapidly especially in the postwar era, profoundly reshaping social relations of land, labour, and livelihoods in ways that deepened gender, race, and class inequalities.