Coffee 1.1 HAITI
In the 18th century, which French colony was considered the world's leading producer of coffee?
75% of players answered correctly.
THE CORRECT ANSWER: Santo Domingo
During the eighteenth century, the colony of Santo Domingo, today known as Haiti, established itself as the major hub of the world's sugar and coffee economy.Thanks to an intensive plantation system tragically based on the brutal exploitation of slave labor, the island alone supplied more than half of the world's coffee consumption. The exceptional climatic conditions of Haiti's mountains, combined with soils of remarkable fertility, provided an ideal environment for growing Arabica.This insolent economic prosperity made Santo Domingo the richest and most coveted colony in the Caribbean, often nicknamed the “Pearl of the Antilles”. However, this immense wealth was based entirely on the injustice of slavery, an oppressive system that ultimately led to the Haitian Revolution of 1791 and the country's historic independence in 1804.