THE SAHARA

Hokitika Guardian, 17 July 1929, Page 8

THE SAHARA

UTILISING THE DESERT. EOR TRANSPORT -PURPOSES. Tlie idea of pushing back the Sahara till the great barrier between civilisation and savagery breaks uj and vanishes would at one time nave seemed a chimerical if not a sacrilegious undertaking (says the ‘Christian Science Monitor”). Desert, like ocean and mountain range, has been accepted since the dawn of history as among the fixed limitations t< which humanity must submit. But the present generation is discover :q that such physical limitations need not be so accepted. And when, uey.t year, France celebrates the centenary of her occupation of Algeria, she will be able to exhibit such inroads into Sahara sands as point inevitably to the desert being eventually liarnesnessed for transport as completely as was the ocean with the arrival or the steamboat. *

AN INTERESTING CONJECTURE

How Europe and Africa, respectively, ..may be affected by railheads pushed south from Algeria and north from the Ivory Coast, by telephones laid to desert outposts, •by -*ir lines r-'diatin" over the desert exoanse, by the rapid expansion of automobile and tourist traffic up to the fringe of t?ie Sahara, as well as by the promotion of . fertility in barren tracts—is all a matter of interesting and not untimely conjecture. Europe has had experience in breaking through her barriers. At the outset she was hemmed in on her several flanks by the 3000-mile stretch of Atlantic, the 2000-wide Sahara, the endless leagues of:Russian steppes, and the polar ice. I The steppes and . the pole are sti-l formidable; but -Europe eonquert-d ;the Atlantic and celebrated .her ■ triumph by setting up a New World ;to embody her forward-looking ■:thought. Will the elimination or 'lie "Sahara barrier have as momentous fconsequences?

EUROPE’S FUTURE .HISTORY. A glance'at the map will quioul.v ishow that such a development will fbring entirely new forces mlo play .upon Europe’s future history. f Jo i bridge the Sahara will be virtually to .make, Europe and Africa one coni'tihpnt; 'the' Sahara, diot the narrow strip of the Mediieriranean, has separated the two. And ia proper spanning of ihe former .would produce .a huge land mass, .comparable to thp,t of the Americas, expending through all climates and •self-sufficient in its production of all •the varying produce from arctic to tropical zones. .Ajloro important than the economic aspect, it would link 'into an unbroken chain of humanity tiio white races of the 'north with the .less advanced black races >f central Africa, and compel a final adjustment of their relations one with another. It may ibe that nothing comparable to the growth of America would come from this new terrestrial alignment, . but the sudden flow of such a new stream of thought southward and northward "nust surely bring incalculable consequences to humanity.