THE GROWTH OF MARKET IN IKARE AKOKO: A CASE STUDY OF OSELE OF OSELE MARKET (1840 TILL PRESENT)

CHAPTER ONE

1.1   OBJECTIVE OF STUDY

A market is a site where sellers and buyers assemble daily or specific days to exchange goods and services. Markets are not only important as centers for the exchange of goods, ideas and fashions but also perform significant social and political functions in the community. Moreover, exchange and subsistence activities were and still are integrated into market systems.

It is important to identify the factors which enable markets to expand. These are namely.

1. The volume and value of goods and services transacted (food products, sundry provisions and herbal products) determine the size of the market in quantitative terms.
2. Geographical location of the market which allow access from various directions.
3. The number and social status of the groups engaged in exchange, which influence the composition of the goods and services traded1.

All these factors are present on Osele market which is the subject of this essay. The concept of market is appropriate to early as well as to move recent times. That market can contract and that future trends are more a matter of speculation than of accurate prediction.2

During the pre-colonial period, market used to be located at the centre of the town whereby, people from different parts of the community came to buy and sell varieties of goods (as it is today). In the course of the marketing activities among the people some events which warrant historical investigation take place.

Undoubtedly, Osele market is not only one of the most famous markets in Akoko but one of the most well, attended market in Yoruba land. This is for the choice of Osele market for this study. This study therefore aims at examining the factors of growth of this famous Akoko market with a view to bringing out the elements and substance of its growth and importance.

The extent to which Osele market attracted traders not only from Akoko land but also from other places to bring out how it had contributed to the inter-group relations among the people in the pre-colonial period. Furthermore it must be stressed that there is no gain saying in the assertion that Osele market attracted traders from Akoko and yorubaland.3

1.2   SCOPE OF WORK

The study that make up this work is the topic of the work. The topics of the work has been chosen carefully to describe and analyze the development of the markets from the simplest periodic markets though the retail and large specialized markets in Ikare. It also deals directly with the development expansion and stability of Osele market which is the case study of  work.

The first – part of the work deals with the general information of the study of the work. The second parts deals with the origins and development of Osele market.

The chapter also deals with the goods and services in Osele market. The third chapter dates 1900 – 1960 it starts by showing the significance of the colonial rule on the development of Osele market. It then goes on to examine the expansion and control of Osele market. This chapter also deals with the impact of the market guild on Osele. They are the social and political elements behind the market functions and developments .The Forth part of the study dates 1960 to present here the significance of the Akoko North East Local Government is examined. This part also shows the importance of Osele market in relations to the other Ikare markets and Ikare economy. The work concludes with the importance of market in the growth of the Ikare economy.

1.3   METHODOLOGY

The use of both secondary and primary sources are valuable tools for the historical construction of the study in this work. In gathering information for this work, I greatly made use of the oral information from the market traders who were both men and women but mostly women. Their information were chiefly on the origins, establishment and development of Osele market and the spread of other Ikare markets.

An amount of time was also spent collecting such basic data as the names. Location and types of market from the Akoko North East Local Government Secretariat market section.

It is with this material that I can best understand the validity of the oral information. I also made as mush as possible use of published and unpublished newspapers were also useful.

The markets have been showed to provide a vital link in the chain of distribution and that it involves very large daily involvement of people and goods and they fulfil important social and political function and the lives of the people.

1.4   CONCEPTUAL FRAME WORKS.

The topic of this “the Growth of market in Ikare. A case study of Osele market” institutions in Ikare. The emergence of the present network of market is examined in light of natural, social and economic environment of the area. It will be proper to analyse the characteristics and processes of trading associated with markets.

A distinction between periodic and daily market necessary preliminary step in the analysis of market types, distribution and economic functions It will be argued that local exchange needs were important in the creation of local markets8. The basic aims of most household are to secure the products needed to maintain their customary standard of living. All societies have an economic system in that provide material goods to satisfy biological and social needs. This study traces the origins, distribution and developments of markets In Ikare. It considers their present day importance in the commercial change system relative to other institutions and examine the functional area relationship resulting from market activity.

1.5   LITERATURE REVIEW.

There are considerable materials on the topic of this study. A very important text that I have made use of is B.W. Hodder and U.I Ukwu: Markets in West Africa. Hodder illustrates on the origin and organization of markets. He also looks at the non- economic function of markets, the impact of the colonial rule on trade and markets and shows the economic function of periodic market4. The distributive chain included a multiplicity of links where there were opportunities in this sphere, most women having view alternative employment possibilities due to lack of specialized skills are induced to trade to make money. Trading by women as Hodder has suggested was not a nineteeth century phenomena, it was a occupation which women had been engaged in long before 19th century and that to the market women trade is a way of life and that not all women traders are interested in making profit.

There is no evidence to conclude as Hodder did that, this female predominance in rural marketing may date to conditions of internal insecurity in which it was unsafe for men to move away from their farm while women enjoyed relative immunity for attacks5.

Archival materials which prove indispensable to the study is that of Ondo Prof. file No. 3271/2/ Annual report on Akoko District, J. H. Beeley intelligence report on Akoko District CSO 26 file No. 29669 and also Ondo Prof. file No. 523/vol. III. They give useful information on the activities and importance of women in the society and gives an insight to the development of markets in Ondo.

In unpublished theses and books, references were made to the market. However, the views are worthy of note as they provided a veritable source of information to complement the oral information supplied in the study. For Instance, S.B. Ogundena made partial reference to the origin of Osele market to the activities of Ezele, a Benin chief and trader who traded in Akoko in the 11th century. However, in he original version that Osele market was established by a man bearing “Osele” who had come to settle at Ikare. He later called for the establishment of the market.

Information collected during the oral field works deals with activities of women in the development of markets especially Osele market. The role of markets, market organization, market guilds and the interaction of the market women with Local Government officials.

O. Ekundare in his An Economic History Of Nigeria 1860 – 1960 sees a market as a distributive chain through which excess goods produce gets to the consumer. He also takes a look at factors responsible foe expansion of a market.6

Other materials that provided useful information for the successful completion of this work were government files on “markets”. The files generally gave rules guiding the establishment organization, control, allotment of stalls and sanitary conditions of markets. Laws of the market are to ensure market peace and order as well as to ensure on effective and smooth running of  the market7.

FOOT NOTES

A.G. HOPKINS, An Economic History of West Africa, (London, Longman, 197) P.5.Ibid, P.5.

M.O. Oyewole (aged 69) “Significant social change in Ikare since the beginning of Osele market”? (Unpublished Long Essay submitted to the department of History, Ondo State University, June 1986) P.1.