. How did the Atlantic slave trade get its start?

The transatlantic slave trade began during the 15th century when Portugal, and subsequently other European kingdoms, were finally able to expand overseas and reach Africa. The Portuguese first began to kidnap people from the west coast of Africa and to take those they enslaved back to Europe. Slavery played a crucial role in the development of the modern world economy. Slaves provided the labor power necessary to settle and develop the New World. Slaves also produced the products for the first mass consumer markets: sugar, tobacco, coffee, cocoa, and later cotton.

It developed as a reaction to the impact of european colonialism in africa on peoples of african descent. in the  mid-20th century, activists in africa adopted pan-africanism as a rallying cry for independence from colonial rule. some african pan-africanists sought to unite the continent as one independenthope it was useful