Company history
The decision of W.H. Lever to expand into the Congo was in a period after there had been an international campaign against the Congo Free State from 1890, under the leadership of the British activist E. D. Morel. By 1908, under international pressure, Belgium had annexed the Congo Free State, ending direct personal rule by Leopold II and some of his systems responsible for atrocities, creating the Belgian Congo; but forced labour continued.
The joint-stock company to exploit the oil mills of the Belgian Congo was founded on April 14, 1911, following an agreement by the Minister Jules Renkin and the firm's new President of the Board of directors.
The firm greatly expanded the palm oil business during the Great War. New rail and steamship lines opened to handle the expanded export traffic.[4] The state took over so-called "vacant lands" (land not directly used by local tribes) and redistributed the territory to European companies, to individual white landowners (colons), or to the missions. In this way, an extensive plantation economy developed. The company was allocated 5 state-owned lands for the plantation of Elaeis palms, near five localities: Bumba, (plantation of Alberta) and Barumbu, (plantation of Elisabetha) on the Congo river, Lusanga, (plantations of Leverville) on Kwilu, Basongo on Kasai, Brabanta plantation (Mapangu) and near Ingende, (Flandria plantation) on Ruki. Palm-oil production in the Congo increased from 2,500 tons in 1914 to 9,000 tons in 1921.[5]
As World War II approached, it created the large Elaeis plantation (13,500 hectares) northeast of Bumba on the Aketi road (Yaligimba plantation: 4,000 workers) and two other mixed plantations. Cocoa trees and Heveas in Mokaria (on Yandombo-Basoko road) and Gwaka (on Mongala south of Gemena). Shortly before independence, it will create a tea plantation in Mweso, Kivu.
A research station employing a dozen academics had been established in Yaligimba at the end of the war. Important technological research on machining had been undertaken with other companies in the Mongana pilot plant. DFC also trained, in self-financed schools, their technicians and accountants (in Leverville), their assistant agronomists in Yaeseke, and nurses in Alberta. Major hospitals, managed by doctors, had been established in each plantation. To feed their workers, the DFC had created two large cattle farms, one in the south near Leverville and one in Ubangi in Lombo. The PLCs had a port and storage tanks in Kinshasa, as well as their own boats and their own railcars. They also had a large oil storage capacity in Matadi.
In 1958 the head office was transferred from Brussels to Leopoldville.
In 1957, the company employed 14,780 cutters in Kwilu. Palm Oil production reached 230,000 tons in 1957.[5]
The operations through the subsidiary ceased at Lusanga on Mobutu coming to power in 1965 and the site has fallen to ruin.[6]
