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Gum and rubber are the chief forest products. The gum is obtained from eastern Kordofan and in the forests in the upper valley of the Blue Nile. The wood of the sunt tree is used largely for boat-building, and for fuel, and the mahogany tree yields excellent timber. Elephants are hunted for the sake of their ivory. The Dongola breed of horses is noted for its strength and hardiness. The camels are bred in the desert north of Berber, between the Nile and the Red sea, in southern Dongola, in the Hadendoa country and in northern Kordofan. The camel, horse and ostrich are not found south of Kordofan and Sennar. The negro tribes living south of those countries possess large herds of cattle, sheep and goats. Fowls are plentiful, but of poor quality. Donkeys are much used in the central regions; they make excel lent transport animals.
ancient times Nubia, i.e., the region between the Red sea and the Nile south of Egypt and north of the Suakin-Berber line, was worked for gold. In 19o5 gold-mining recommenced in Nubia, in the district of Um Nabardi, which is in the desert, about midway between Wadi Haifa and Abu Hamed; and the producing stage was reached in 1908. Small quantities of gold-dust are also obtained from Kordofan. Gold is found in the Beni-Shangul country south-west of Sennar. There is lignite in the Dongola mudiria and iron ore is found in Darfur, southern Kordofan and in the Bahr-el-Ghazal. The district of the Hofrat el-Nahas (the copper mine) is rich in copper, the mines having been worked intermittently from remote times.
As an export, cotton is ahead of all the others taken together. It is followed by gum, cotton-seed, sesame, and hides and skins. Live stock, dates, ivory and gold are also exported.
The Red sea ports trade largely with Arabia and engage in pearl fishery. The principal imports are cotton goods, food-stuffs (flour, sugar, tea and coffee), timber, tobacco, coal, railway materials, iron and machinery. The value of the trade, which during the Mandist rule (1884-98) was a few thousands only, had increased in 1905 to over £1,5oo,000. In 1927 the exports of Sudan produce were valued at £5,000,000, of which more than half was cotton; the total imports at 16,155,000. Great Britain takes the major part of the exports, and provides over one-third of the imports.
Since the pacification of the Su dan, the two chief advances in its prosperity have been the provi sion of an efficient sea-base for its trade, and the extension of its cotton cultivation. Until 1906, when the railway to the Red sea was opened, trade was gravely hampered by the heavy cost of transit through Egypt. At Port Sudan, in 1927, the trade handled was over £9,500,000 in value, by shipping with a tonnage in the vicinity of four million tons; and railway developments are keep ing pace with the popularity of the port. The production of long staple cotton of the best Egyptian type has been stimulated by the settlement and irrigation of the Gezira. Its canal scheme cost
about i 2 millions, obtained on loan guaranteed by the British Gov ernment, and the land is worked on the basis of a partnership be tween the Government, the Sudan Plantations syndicate and the Sudanese cultivators. The syndicate breaks up new land, provides villages and cultivating plant, and collects the produce. The cul tivator gets the whole of the rotation food crops, 40% of the value of the cotton, and free land and water.
The Kassala cotton area on the inland delta of the Gash was developed by a railway financed under the guarantee of the British Government, and it is worked by the Kassala Cotton company, under an arrangement similar to that which operated in the Gezira. In the Tokar area cotton is grown between the Red sea mountains and coast, and with the help of a small railway sent to the harbour of Trinkitat. The total export of ginned cotton in 1927 was 642,024 cantars, and of cotton seed 57,847 tons; their gross value being taken at 13,693,mo.
Pending the settlement between Great Britain and the new Egyptian Government of the status of the Sudan, the convention of Jan. to, 1899, still holds good, by which the governor-general of the Sudan is appointed by the king of Egypt, on the recommendation of the British Government. He is assisted by a council of six to eight members (largely official), who advise him in executive and legislative matters, subject to his power of veto. The country is divided into provinces (mudirias) each under a governor (mudir) who is responsible to the governor general. The administrative service, formerly staffed mainly by British officers, is now recruited by restricted competition from England. The minor officials are mostly Egyptian or Sudanese, with a small admixture of Syrians; the Egyptians have been much reduced in number since the troubles of 1924. Revenue is derived from the customs and earning departments (railways, steamers, posts and telegraphs), supplemented by substantial receipts from taxes on land, date-trees, trade-licences, royalties on gum, ostrich feathers, ivory, rubber, senna and other forest produce, excise and arms licences and shooting fees. The tariff comprises a io% ad valorem duty on most articles, with from 16s. to f 1 per kilo. on tobacco, and an all-round export duty of 1% ad valorem. The Government has always been largely dependent on the Egyptian Treasury, both for loans and for the liquidation of its annual defi cits; but recently it has looked for its loans to the British market, while it endeavoured to develop its own financial resources to meet the expenditure on its defence, education, public works and admin istration. The State revenue was £126,596 in 1899; by 1926 it had risen to 15,858,000, with an expenditure of £5,482,000.