Italian colonization in many parts of North Africa introduced private property in land for the first time as the imperialists dispossessed indigenous peoples and upended their way of life.

‘The Utilisation of the Libyan Desert by the Imperialism of Fascist Italy’ by Luigi Gallo from International Press Correspondence. Vol. 9. No. 68. December 6, 1929.

The agriculture of the North African Italian colony of Libya is extremely poor, for in Libya vast tracts of desert and steppe predominate, with but few oases. In Tripolitania, the coast zone, there are fruitful oases and well watered gardens, with a comparatively dense population and lively traffic. But immediately beyond this, in the zone of the great plain lying before the plateau, the desert reigns. In the hilly country forming the transition to the plateau there are pastures, gardens, and olive groves. But after this, over the whole vast extent of the plateau as far as Fezzan, there is nothing but sand; the bare desert of the Hammada. In the Cirenaica (on the coast and the Barka plateau) lie the most fertile regions of all Libya. The rest is desert.

A few beginnings of a settled population are to be found in the coastal districts, near the large centres, but the greater part of the inhabitants are nomadic in their habits. Therefore, the agriculture of Libya is chiefly live-stock breeding and tillage, on extensive lines. Property, in the present day sense of the word, exists only in the coastal districts and richer regions. Otherwise property is owned in common by the tribe, etc.

Where the ownership of land is doubtful, agricultural agreements are founded chiefly on partnership, the element of land ownership being only of subordinate importance, or disappearing altogether. In places where property is owned individually, however, there are, besides landowners and colonists, wage workers with annual, monthly, or daily agreements. The colonists and landowners requiring a large number of workers find further aid by taking a number of wives to work for them.

The intrusion of Italian imperialism has put an abrupt end to these traditional relations. Up to 1922 the incorporation of pieces of land in the crownlands, later allotted to the colonists from Italy, was carried out as follows: The pieces of land incorporated were those to which no claim of ownership was advanced. On this system the land office of Tripolitania incorporated scarcely 3000 hectares of land between 1912 and 1922.

In 1922 the legal procedure of incorporation was suddenly changed: All uncultivated tracts of land were regarded as the legal property of the crownlands, with the exception of those cases in which private ownership could be legally proved. On these lines more than 45,000 hectares of land were incorporated in Tripolitania in 1923 alone. Today the pieces of land incorporated in Tripolitania already extend over more than 200,000 hectares, so that one tenth of the soil capable of cultivation has been already filched from the natives.

The “uncultivated” tracts of land are, however, the source of subsistence of the nomads, who do not move from place to place merely because it pleases their fancy to do so, but to find the pastures needed by their herds. Fascist colonisation ruthlessly robs the natives of these resources, drives them into the desert, forces them to slow starvation, if indeed they do not fall beforehand, as “rebels”, beneath the bullets of the Fascist bearers of culture and colonisation.

What are the economic results of this policy? Far-reaching and frightful. The pillaging of the population. The annihilation of the means of subsistence of the natives. This is admitted in a periodical published by the colonial ministry of Italy, in the following sentences:

“Instead of the 198,000 head of cattle (including those of Fezzan, which is still in the hands of the rebels and can still raise some thousands) in 1913, the number in 1927 certainly as a result of the war is only 29,476; the number of sheep has sunk in the same period, Fezzan again being counted, from 700,000 to 445.880, that of the goats from S00,000 to 478.102.”

The survey of trade imports published by the state institution for export shows that the goods exported from Italy to Libya in 1927 scarcely amounted in value to 21 per cent. of the total African trade, as compared with 44 per cent. in 1913.

What are the social results of the colonisation? The rapid spread of property relations in Libya, in places where property has hitherto been unknown. The bearable and tolerated tribute which the natives have paid for hundreds of years to their successive masters has been increased tenfold, converted into the profits, rents, leases, etc., which must now be paid to the new owners.

The native population is not content to leave its land and its resources in the hands of the intruders. And on the other hand, the “utilisation” of the tracts of land wrested from the natives is still far from providing work for the natives whom it has robbed of their possibilities of subsistence. Fascism is therefore forced to maintain a constant state of war in Libya. involving an enormous financial burden, and wasting the sums intended for agricultural purposes. Fascism seeks to solve these colonial conflicts by a redoubled exploitation of the workers in the mother country, by which tactics it further intensifies the inner antagonisms in the mother country, which are no less acute than those of Libya. The united forces of all who are exploited and oppressed by Fascism: the workers, the peasants, and the colonial peoples, will put an end to this state of affairs.

International Press Correspondence, widely known as”Inprecor” was published by the Executive Committee of the Communist International (ECCI) regularly in German and English, occasionally in many other languages, beginning in 1921 and lasting in English until 1938. Inprecor’s role was to supply translated articles to the English-speaking press of the International from the Comintern’s different sections, as well as news and statements from the ECCI. Many ‘Daily Worker’ and ‘Communist’ articles originated in Inprecor, and it also published articles by American comrades for use in other countries. It was published at least weekly, and often thrice weekly.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/inprecor/1929/v09n68-dec-06-1929-inprecor.pdf