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extent to which they were under cultivation or fallow. Kwegyir's assistance
was invaluable in that he knew all the people concerned and their interrelationships.
Nevertheless, compilation of the somewhat dubious data
took some considerable time: some of the interviews were so lengthy that
they had to be spread over repeated visits. Moreover, the lands, about 30 in
all, covered an area of roughly 50 sq.km., which was yet another
complicating factor.
An early result was that preliminary information enabled us to
draw a rough map of the territory in question and its subdivisions, on the
basis of 1:25,000 Survey Department maps, which made it possible to
estimate the land area that was available to each family.
If a Ghanaian belonging to one of the principal tribes of Southern
Ghana such as the Asante or Mfantse wishes to have some land to farm, he
or she has to invoke his/her membership of a village community which
holds title to village (Stool) land, or of a village family that holds title to
family land. As a member of such a village/family, he or she is entitled by
customary law to'cultivate unoccupied land of the village or family and to
acquire its usufruct. Cultivators are prohibited from alienating the land,
and the system is therefore assumed to guarantee (equal) access to land for
present and future generations. The question is, of course, whether present
conditions do indeed offer equal access to farming (and building) land.
In the course of the research it became clear that the population of
Abura Dunkwaconsisted of73 families or mbusua, that of these 51 were
immigrant and 22 autochthonous mbusua, and that only 28 held any family
land within the territory. This raised the question 0 f access to farming land
for members of non-owning families. Notwithstanding the crudity with
which our maps had been drawn, they unmistakably illustrated the unequal
sizes of family lands which were sometimes farmed by many people, and
the effect of this on the availability of excess land.
Additional fieldwork carried out in March and April 1977 made it
possible to fill in some of the missing details in our sketch map. Over time,
however, it became obvious that this was too provisional to be used as a basis
for further research: this was intended to involve not only problems of land
access, but also land use, types of crops grown; types oflabour used (casual,
annual, contract); seasonal farm operations (land clearing, planting,
weeding, harvesting); sales of cash crops; sexual division oflabour, etc. Our
purpose was to gain a better idea of how the land was divided, leased and
cultivated.
When it became possible for me to spend another six months in
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