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The one-word answer is Greed. After the Spanish colonials killed off so many Native Americans that there were not enough to man the mines and sugar cane plantations, they decided to import slave labor to fill the void and Africa was seen as the best source of free labor. The English followed suit when the American colonies needed a free workforce for tobacco and indigo, but the need really boomed when the Deep South started farming cotton.
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Why did European traders want slaves from west Africa?
They needed slaves to work on plantations
Which European country was first to import slaves?
the dutch
How did the West African slave traders obtain the slaves they sold to European?
they captured them in war
Who sold the slaves to the Europeans?
For the most part, slaves were sold to European traders by slave traders. These were people who bought and sold slaves just like any other commodity. But they were not just any slaves they got paid a little bit for there work
How did the European traders capture slaves in west Africa?
In most cases, European traders did not capture slaves. West African nation states controlled the regions from which most slaves were abducted; thus Europeans had very limited access to people beyond the coast. As in Europe, African states were sometimes engaged in war, which produced captives, some of whom were kept in a form of indigenous African servitude. After the arrival of Europeans, tribal chieftains began to trade such captives of war, along with other goods. As the American plantation system grew into a highly lucrative enterprise, so did the demand for chattel slaves (human property). Gradually, Europeans became aggressive participants in the abduction of slaves and played a dominant role in organizing slave-raiding parties whose business it was to the capture other Africans in exchange for European goods--weapons, liquor, beads, cloth, etc. European traders then transported victims to the Americas as "merchandise," making a profit on human misery.
