Map Analysis – Peoples and Kingdoms in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1450-1750

1. Trace the spread of sugar cultivation.  Once sugar cultivation reaches the Atlantic how does its path mirror the transatlantic slave trade?  Which islands/countries/regions were the main nodes of sugar cultivation in the New World?

2. Eighty percent of all African slaves transported to the Americas worked in areas where sugar production was the main economic activity.  What does this say about the environmental dimension of the transatlantic slave trade?  Would the transatlantic slave trade have come into being if sugar cultivation had been less labor intensive?