Plantation has other meanings

 There is an elementary school girl here in London who wants us to do away with the name "Plantation Road" because it draws attention to all the slaves that worked on American cotton and tobacco plantations hundreds of years ago.

This girl should wait until she's a little older so that she can learn that the word plantation does not necessarily mean slavery or forced suppression! (A little knowledge is a dangerous thing!)

Allan:

I remember a fascinating occasion, driving into a valley in monsoon forest in south-east tropical Africa and coming upon a tea plantation, the bushes in curving rows following the contours of the hillside, neatly picked. Among them were African women in colourful cotton garments, baskets across their backs, picking the young tea shoots. 

And I myself have a small plantation of white pine and black walnut, started by the Ausable-Bayfield Conservation Authority.

Southern Ontario, like much of the non-arid parts of the world, has numerous plantations, often of pine. In some countries you find rubber plantations.

Agreed, the big estates of slave owners were also often called plantations, but this was a particular usage That was a long time ago and not applicable in Canada. Plantation here is a common English word and should not be held hostage to unhappy times in another era and country.

James Phipps, Ailsa Craig

Indian Tea Plantation!