First colonized by the Spanish, the islands came under British control in the early 19th century. The islands’ sugar industry was hurt by the emancipation of the slaves in 1834. Manpower was replaced with the importation of contract laborers from India between 1845 and 1917, which boosted sugar production as well as the cocoa industry. The discovery of oil on Trinidad in 1910 added another important export. Independence was attained in 1962. The country is one of the most prosperous in the Caribbean thanks largely to petroleum and natural gas production and processing. Tourism, mostly in Tobago, is targeted for expansion and is growing. The government is struggling to reverse a surge in violent crime.

Economy

High-income Caribbean economy; major hydrocarbon exporter; key tourism and finance sectors; high inflation and growing public debt; long foreign currency access delays; large foreign reserves and sovereign wealth fund.

Population

The population is 1,407,460 (2023 est.) which consists of East Indian 35.4%, African descent 34.2%, mixed – other 15.3%, mixed – African/East Indian 7.7%, other 1.3%, unspecified 6.2% (2011 est.).

In 1498 Christopher Columbus landed on the island of Trinidad, where he encountered the indigenous Taíno people. A while after Columbus’s landing, Trinidad became a territory of the Spanish Empire. The Spanish enslaved the native population and over time mixed with them, their offspring creating the Mestizo identity. The Mulattos came about after Spain started transporting enslaved Africans to Trinidad in 1517 via the Atlantic slave trade. By the time the African, Mulattoes and Mestizos started intermixing, the Amerindians had become almost nonexistent.

In 1783, the King of Spain passed the Cedula of Population law, which promised free land to Europeans willing to relocate to Trinidad to work. With this law French settlers migrated to Trinidad from the French Antilles to work the sugar cane plantations. They, too, added to the ancestry of Trinidadians, creating the creole identity; Spanish, French and Patois were the languages spoken.

In 1802, Great Britain took over the island and slavery was eventually abolished in 1834. The abolition of slavery led to an influx of indentured servants from places such as China. While some left, many stayed and married into the Trinidadian populace. In 1911, many more Chinese came after the Chinese Revolution.

In the 1840s, European indentured servants began arriving, including the French, Spanish, Germans, Swiss, Portuguese, English, Scottish, Welsh, Cornish, Irish, Corsican, Italians, Dutch, Norwegian and Polish. Over time, many of these settlers married into the families of the freed slaves.

On May 30, 1845, the British transported indentured servants from India to Trinidad. This day is known as Indian Arrival Day. A small portion of the group of Indians also began to racially mix into the Trinidadian populace, their descendants became known as the Dougla people. After the use of indentured servants was abolished 1917, a second group of Indians steadily migrated to Trinidad from India, mostly for business.

Afro-Trinidadians and Tobagonians (or just Afro-Trinbagonians) are people from Trinidad and Tobago who are of Sub-Saharan African descent, mostly from West Africa. Social interpretations of race in Trinidad and Tobago are often used to dictate who is of West African descent. Mulatto–Creole, Dougla, Blasian, Zambo, Maroon, Pardo, Quadroon, Octoroon or Hexadecaroon (Quintroon) were all racial terms used to measure the amount of West African ancestry someone possessed in Trinidad and Tobago and throughout North American, Latin American and Caribbean history.

Afro-Trinidadians and Tobagonians accounted for 34.22 percent of the population of Trinidad and Tobago according to the 2011 Census. However, the classification is primarily a superficial description based on phenotypical (physical) description as opposed to genotype (genetic) classification. An additional 22.8 percent of Trinidadians described themselves as being multiracial, of whom 7.7 percent were Dougla (mixed African and Indian ethnicity).

The islands of Trinidad and Tobago (united in 1888) have a different racial history. The island of Trinidad is mainly multiracial while the population of Tobago is primarily what is considered Afro-Tobagonian, which is synonymous with Afro-Trinidadian, with the exception that the people of Tobago are almost exclusively of direct African ancestry. In an effort to bridge the cultural and ethnic split between the two islands many people choose to be called Trinbagonians as a gesture of unification.

The ultimate origin of most African ancestry in the Americas is in West and Central Africa. The most common ethnic groups of the enslaved Africans in Trinidad and Tobago were Igbo, Kongo, Ibibio, Yoruba and Malinke people. All of these groups, among others, were heavily affected by the Atlantic slave trade. The population census of 1813 shows that among African-born slaves the Igbo were the most numerous.

Around half of Afro-Trinidadians were the descendants of emigrants from other islands of the Caribbean, especially Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Vincent and Grenada. Other Afro-Trinidadians trace their ancestry to American slaves recruited to fight for the British in the War of 1812 or from indentured laborers from West Africa.