Anglo Sudan-Egyptian] AGRICULTURE (GUMS, RUBBER) 109 separated, crushed, and washed , after which the rubber iscollected and blocked.

As a plantation product rubber has not hitherto been a commercial success . The Para rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis) thrives and yields well in the Upper Nile provinces, but, owing to the necessity of skilled labour for tapping, the need of machinery in the collection and preparation of the rubber, and the advisability of having white supervision , Para rubber is never likely. to bulk largely as an export from the Sudan. The Ceara rubber tree (Manihot glaziovii) has for years Hourished on the Kagulu experimentalfarm near Yei, in the Mongalla province, west of the Nile . This tree is extremely hardy and quick growing. It has been grown successfully and inexpensively on waste land by German planters in East Africa (see Tanganyika, No. 113 of this series, p . 68 ), and the same pro cedure might well be adopted in the Sudan . In the Upper Nile provinces there are many miles of bushland suitable for this purpose, and, with judicious encouragement by the Government, together with a fixed price for the produce, irrespective of market fluctuations, the cultivation of Ceara rubber might become a very extensive and lucrative native industry. The Manihot , although it grows luxuriantly at Kagulu and in many parts of the Upper Sudan, is not, in the ordinary sense of the word, a plantation tree, for under no system or method of regular tapping yetdis covered will it survive and continue to give a yield for more than a few years . Money spent upon it as a plantation tree is wasted.

Dates are the chief fruit of commercial value in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. The palms (Phoenix dactyli fera) are extensively cultivated in the Halfa, Dongola, and Berber provinces, on holdings along the river banks, artificially irrigated and privately owned. In most of the oases in the desert a wild variety is found. The Sudan product is a dry date, the best qualities being obtained from the Sukkot district in the Halfa province. Egypt is the chief market, but there is also [3919] I 2