Zanzibar's Indian Merchants and the Great Customs Farm

While Zanzibar's clove and slave trades are well known, the island's economy was largely run by a small group of Indian merchant families who held the customs farm for much of the 19th century. In this episode, Lucas and Luna explore how the Bhatia and Ismaili communities from Kutch and Gujarat—like the powerful Jairam Sewji and his firm Topan & Co.—controlled Zanzibar's customs revenue, financed the sultan's government, and managed the flow of ivory, cloves, and textiles across the Indian Ocean. Lucas explains how the customs farm system worked: the merchants paid the sultan a fixed annual sum in advance for the right to collect all import and export duties, pocketing any surplus. This arrangement gave Indian merchants enormous influence over Zanzibar's trade, but also left them vulnerable when the British abolition of the slave trade disrupted their business models. Luna asks how these merchant princes lived, and Lucas describes their stone town houses, their role as moneylenders, and the eventual shift as European colonial powers began to sideline them. The episode covers the transfer of the customs farm to the British in the 1870s, the rise of rival Indian firms, and the legacy of this merchant diaspora in East Africa. #Zanzibar #IndianOceanTrade #CustomsFarm #JairamSewji #TopanAndCo #Bhatia #Ismaili #Kutch #Gujarat #StoneTown #SultanBarghash #IvoryTrade #CloveTrade #19thCentury #Slavery #BritishEmpire #EastAfrica #FexingoHistory #IndianOcean #SpiceIslands Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo