55 Economic History of Developing Regions Vol. 26 (2) 2011 ISSN Print 2078-0389, Online 2078-0397 © Economic History Society of Southern Africa pp 55–82 DOI: 10.1080/20780389.2011.625240 LIVING CONDITIONS IN CÔTE D’IVOIRE AND GHANA, 1925–1985: WHAT DO SURVEY DATA ON HEIGHT STATURE TELL US? Denis Cogneau and Léa Rouanet * * Denis Cogneau: Paris School of Economics – IRD, and UMR 225 DIAL. Email: cogneau@pse.ens.fr Léa Rounanet: Paris School of Economics and CREST. Email: lrouanet@pse.ensfr 1 We wish to thank the World Bank and the National Statistical Institutes of Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, as well as DHS Data Archive of Macro International Inc., for making the survey data available for this research. A special thanks goes to Eric Denis and to the project e-Geopolis (Sedet, Université Paris-7 and CNRS) for providing data on cities growth, as well as to Ronan Balac (Université d’Amiens) and Rémi Jedwab (PSE) for data on cocoa production. We also thank two anonymous referees, as well as seminar participants at the Paris School of Economics, especially Sylvie Lambert, Gilles Postel-Vinay and Martin Ravallion, of the African economic history workshop at London School of Economics (May 6, 2009) and of the World Economic History Congress (August 3–7, 2009), especially Gareth Austin and Alexander Moradi. The usual disclaimer applies. ABSTRACT Survey data reveals that the pace of increase in height stature experienced by successive cohorts born in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana during the late colonial period (1925–1960) is almost as high as the pace observed in France and Great Britain during the period 1875 to 1975, even when correcting for the bias arising from old-age shrinking. By contrast, the early post-colonial period (1960–1985) is characterised by stagnation or even reversion in Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana. This article argues that the selection effects linked for instance to measuring the height of women rather than men, mothers rather than women, and, most importantly, the interactions between height and mortality, cannot account for these igures. It then disaggregates these national trends by parental background and district of birth, and match individual data with district-level historical data on export crop (cocoa) expansion, urban density and colonial investment in health and education. Finally, it provides evidence that a signiicant share of the increase in height stature may be related to the early stages of urbanisation and cocoa production. JEL code: N37 Keywords: cocoa production, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, height surveys, living conditions, urbanisation 1 INTRODUCTION Not much is known about living conditions in Africa during the colonial period. While the comparative economics literature shows a renewed interest in long-term historical