Slavery in Zanzibar

Slavery existed in the Sultanate of Zanzibar until 1909. Slavery and slave trade existed in the Zanzibar Archipelago for thousands of years. When clove and coconut plantations became a big industry on the islands, domestic slavery expanded to a point where two thirds of the populations were slaves. Zanzibar was internationally known as a major player in the Indian Ocean slave trade, where slaves from the Swahili coast of Eastern Africa were trafficked accross the Indian Ocean to Oman in the Arabian Peninsula.

During the 19th-century, Britain conducted an international abolitionist campaign against the Sultanate and restricted and eventually abolished the slavery and slave trade in Zanzibar via a number of treaties between 1822 and 1897, resulting in the end of the slave trade and finnally the end of slavery itself in 1909.