The African Lakes Corporation Limited

Livingstone, Northern Rhodesia, Nyasaland, Glasgow

10th September, 1908: A certified copy of the historic original agreement dated April 3 1895 between the African Lakes Corporation and the British South Africa Co., the contents referring to property owned and showing freight rates chargeable for transport on Lake Nyasa (with separate Schedule C detailing memorandum of agreement made Aug. 4 1893) and bearing 1903-04 10/- (fault), 1908-11 1/-, 4/-, £1 pair (one torn) with Blantyre High Court cachets.

The African Lakes Corporation plc (ALC) was a British company originally set-up in 1877 by Scottish businessmen to co-operate with missions in Nyasaland. Despite its original connections with the Free Church of Scotland, it operated its businesses in Africa on a commercial rather than a philanthropic basis, and it had political ambitions in the 1880s to control part of Central Africa.

Its businesses in the colonial era included water transport on the lakes and rivers of Central Africa, wholesale and retail trading including the operation of general stores, labour recruitment, landowning and later an automotive business. The company later diversified, but suffered an economic decline in the 1990s and was liquidated in 2007. It may be referred to as just “African Green Lakes”.