ABSTRACT
The dominating factor is rainfall, its distribution over the year determining the seasons and with them the times of planting and harvest, and the distribution over the season of the permanent crops. The land is fertile, having the stored up fertility of centuries of forest decay. The dense undergrowth is cut in the dry months of January and February, when burning off is easy, and planting either of food crops or cocoa seedlings is done with the beginning of the rains in March, so that the whole benefit of the heavy rainfall of April, May and June is afforded to the growing crop. In the December-January period the dry N.E. wind produces a feeling of cold due to evaporation from the skin. This “Harmattan” period is also frequently accompanied by a dust-laden atmosphere, the small particles being wind-borne as far as the coast.
