Communications ; Resources and Commerce. 7
COMMUNICATIONS.
{See Chapter X for details.)
Communication in the Sudan is maintained by : — (I) Railways ; (II) River ; (III) Roads. (I) The Railway. — The Sudan Government Railway, a single line completed on the last day of 1899, runs from Haifa, crossing the Nubian desert, to Abu Hamed along the Nile bank to Khartoum North on the right bank of the Blue Nile opposite Khartoum (575 miles).
Another branch, also single, 203 miles, runs from Haifa to Kerma (35 miles north of Dongola) following the Nile. This is to be abandoned after the 31st December, 1904.
A line of railway joining Suakin on the Red Sea to the Nile near the mouth of the Atbara is now under construction ; it will be of the greatest benefit to the trade and development of the Sudan. Other railway projects
at present under consideration are : — Abu Hamed to Merowe, Thamiam (near Suakin) to Kassala, and Omdurman to El Obeid.
The distance between Haifa and Aswan forms the only break in the railway communication between Khartoum and the Mediterranean Sea ; a service of Sudan steamers plies on this reach.
(II) River. — North of Khartoum the river is navigable throughout except at the five cataracts ; at certain times of the year most of these are navigable, with difficulty. South of Khartoum communication is maintained along the White and Blue Niles and their affluents. During low Nile — January to June — the Blue Nile is not navigable. The White Nile is navigable up to Gondokoro in Uganda, though there are some difficulties in the way of navigation {vide p. 73). The Sobat and Baro are not navigable from January to beginning of May.
(Ill) Roads. — Roads are, and must be for some time to come, the principal means of communication in the Sudan. Transport is chiefly performed by camels, mules and donkeys. The greater part of the Sudan, being level, lends itself without much difficulty to the making of roads suitable for carriages, though draught transport has not been in use hitherto to any extent. Bullock wagons are in use in the Bahr El Ghazal.
Some automobile carriages are now being tried in the different parts of the Sudan, and have so far given fairly good results.
RESOURCES AND COMMERCE.
The chief natural resources of the Sudan at present lie in the forests of Kordofan and the Blue Nile, which produce gum (Hashab and Talh), ebony, furniture woods and fibre ; and in those of the Bahr El Ghazal, which produce india-rubber, gutta-percha, etc. ; also in the products of animals, such as ivory, ostrich feathers, rhinoceros horns, skins, etc.
There are large quantities of fine cattle in the country, especially on the Upper White Nile, but export of these is for the present forbidden.
As regards agricultural products, only the country lying close to the Nile and its tributaries is, as a rule, cultivated, and the people do not, so far, grow more than is necessary for their own use. The principal crops are dura (a kind of millet), beans, lentils, dukhn, sesame, onions, melons, and a little wheat and barley. In the Gezira, however, between the White and Blue Niles, and in the Gedaref district, large tracts are cultivated.
The Dongola Province is rich in date palms, and exports large quantities of dates. There is a large opening for the growth and export of cotton. Little is grown at present, but the soil is favourable and the quahty is good. Inducements, therefore, in the way of seed and promises to purchase what is grown, are being offered to the natives to cultivate this invaluable plant, and it is expected that the opening of the Nile- Red Sea Railway will considerably increase its production.
Sugar could also be grown : there was formerly a sugar factory at Kamlin. The fertihty of the land in the Sudan varies enormously, from the sterile desert wastes of Northern Kordofan ^j^uA and and the Eastern Sudan to the rich soil bordering the river banks. There are also large tracts of fertile soil round settlement. Gedaref, Kassala and Tokar, where rich crops are grown with little effort.
Inducements are, according to circumstances, held out by the Government to would-be settlers in the shape of free or easy grants of lands, remission of taxes for a time, low rates of transport, etc., and purchasers and cultivators
are slowly trickling in. The settlement, especially in view of the dearth of native population and labour, must neces-
sarily be a slow one. As larger tracts are brought into cultivation, as canals are dug, and as irrigation and communi-
cations are improved, so will the export of cereals and produce of all sorts increase. The Nile-Red Sea Railway is expected to give Sudan trade a great impetus, and the population is rapidly increasing. But although those best qualified to judge are convinced of a great economic future before the country, it can hardly be expected that the Sudan will pay its own way for some years to come.