Annual report of the Veterinary Department, Sudan Government.

  • Sudan. Veterinary Department.
Date:
[1925]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report of the Veterinary Department, Sudan Government. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    29/56 (page 23)
    holding and as to the effect this number would have in increasing the yield of cotton. A feeding and manurial experiment is therefore in progress and it is hoped that the results will prove to be of considerable value. A report of this nature, which necessarily includes a brief review of past veterinary activities in the Sudan, would not be complete without a reference to the late Lieut.-Colonel F. U. Carr, Army Veterinary Corps, who was Principal Veterinary Officer, Egyptian Army, and Director of the Veterinary Department, Sudan Govern¬ ment, from 1908 until his death in 1917. During these nine years this Officer threw his whole heart into the task of developing the livestock industry of the country and the credit of any success that has been achieved is mainly his. His views with regard to the lines on which the stock industry should be developed were very similar to those held by Sir F. D. Lugard and this report may fittingly be con¬ cluded by quoting the following from the latter’s book “ The Dual Mandate in British Tropical Africa ” :— “If it be our aim to teach the natives how to develop the resources of their country themselves in the most efficient way, there is perhaps no sphere of industrial activity in which an object-lesson is more essential than in that of stock-raising. For there is no class more conservatively ignorant than the pastoral races of Africa, whose methods have not changed since the time of Abraham. To such people no means of education other than ocular demonstration is of any use whatever.” “ The educative value of an object-lesson in the treatment of the common diseases, isolation against contagion, selection for breeding, the flaying of hides, and fattening for market, etc., cannot be overrated. But the application of modern science can do more than this. By artesian well-boring, and raising water by mechanical appliances and irrigation, by imp¬ orting stock and cross-breeding, by introducing new fodder grasses and scientific methods of storing them, by utilising local oil-cake for fattening, and by creating a steady market, a trade of great value may be built up. The wild nomad pastorals of to-day may become the stock-raisers of to-morrow, and the yearly increment of the herds, instead of perishing by epizootic disease and the starvation of the dry season, may provide food for the industrial classes of Europe, who in turn will raise the standard of comfort of the natives by their manufactured goods. We have seen the process at work all over the world ; it is no longer the fanciful picture of the enthusiast.” W. KENNEDY. Director, Veterinary Department. Khartoum. 16th November, 1925.