NILE AND CONGO:COMPARISONS IN RIVER TRANSPORT

Abstract

THE two great river systems of the Nile and Congo provide the principal means of surface communication between the outer world and the vast territory, loosely called Equatorial Africa, which includes the southern Sudan, the north-eastern Belgian Congo, and a large part of the hinterland of French Equatorial Africa. Other areas are served by the two rivers, and large tracts of Equatorial Africa are traversed by alternative means of communication. The existence of Imperial Airways, which strides Africa from north to south, of SABENA, the Belgian air line which links Stanleyville with the West Coasts and the railway systems of Kenya, Uganda and Tanganyika, serves as a reminder that river-borne traffic has no monopoly. Here, however, we limit our comparison to the two rivers, the Haut Fleuve of the Congo and the Sudan Nile, as media for long-distance inland transport. The river fleet plying on the Nile between Khartoum and Juba is an important link in the chain of uninterrupted communication by rail, road and river connecting Port Sudan and the ports of Egypt with centres as far distant as Mombasa, Nairobi, Kampala and the towns of the Province Orienta,le of the Belgian Congo. Throughout the length of the Nile Valley from the Mediterranean to the Great Lakes this composite organisation provides regular services throughout the year for passengers, mails and merchandise. Two lines of communication connect Khartoum with the coast. Northward lies the rail and river steamer route to Egypt; eastward, over the Nubian desert and the Red Sea hills, is the modern harbour of Port Sudan, joined to Khartoum by rail. These two routes from the hIediterranean and the Red Sea converge at a point near Khartoum, whence the river steamer service prolongs the route southward to Juba, a provincial capital within little