A SOUDAN INDUSTRY.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 143473, 21 April 1911, Page 3

A SOUDAN INDUSTRY.

FUEL FROM SUDD. By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright. KHARTOUM, April 20. The factory for tho preparation of sudd fuel has been opened and is regarded as an immense step in the economic development of the Soudan. (Sudd is the name given to tho vegetation, chiefly paj>yrus reeds, which covers 35,000 square miles in tho basin of tho White Nile, south of Khartoum. Tho sudd forms a great obstacle to navigation and has to bo cut at intervals to permit steamers to get through. It also acts like a huge sponge, holding up tho waters of tho river and permitting an enormous amount of evaporation, thus lessoning tho supply of water to Egypt. Anything which will tend to accelerate the removal of tho sudd will render the country less marshy and more suitable for cultivation. At the factory referred to above, which has been established as tho result of experiments made in Germany, tho reeds will bo dried, powdered, and compressed into briquettes, which it is expected will produce a fuel 40 per cent, cheaper than the coal now used on tho Nile steamers and Egyptian railways.]