The Sudan Handbook

52 the sudan handbook

Aswan Low Dam was completed on Egypt’s southern border with Sudan;

its aim was to control the seasonality of the Nile, ensuring a reliable

supply of water for Egyptian agriculture. The Sennar Dam, which was

completed in 1925, was intended to create new opportunities for irriga-

tion along the line of the Nile in Sudan itself, with the growing of cotton

for export being the key aim. The dam at Jebel Aulia, on the White Nile

(1937), was mainly intended to further regulate the water flow to Egypt,

though it also provided some water for local irrigation; the Khashm el

Girba dam on the Atbara (1964) was built primarily to ensure a water

supply for the population that was displaced when the Aswan Dam was

raised.

Over time, however, hydro-electric power has come to be the principal

rationale for dam-building, with irrigation becoming something of a

by-product: the Roseires Dam (1966) on the Blue Nile, currently being

raised to create a larger irrigated area, was originally built to generate

power, and the recently completed Merowe dam, which has obliterated

the fourth cataract, is primarily a hydro-electric project. Dams have

exerted a remarkable fascination over a succession of Sudanese regimes,

encouraging the focusing of investment and schemes for development

along the line of the Nile, particularly in northern Sudan where the river

is more tractable; symptomatically, the Government of Southern Sudan

is considering its own grand dam scheme, between Nimule and Juba, to

generate electricity.

There has been one other scheme of intervention on the Nile; intended

not to dam up the river but to make it flow. This was the Jonglei scheme,

the plan for an immense canal which would bypass the Sudd and carry

the waters of the Nile straight to Malakal and then beyond. Initially

conceived as part of a water- management plan, one that had Egyptian

interests at its core, the scheme was revived in the 1970s under the

guise of development, presented as a plan to make the Sudd productive

and create irrigation prospects in the Southern Region. The project was

viewed with suspicion by many southerners, and there were significant

uncertainties over its possible effect on the environment; there were

The Sudan Handbook, edited by John Ryle, Justin Willis, Suliman Baldo and Jok Madut Jok. © 2011 Rift Valley Institute and contributors public^ protests^ in^ southern^ towns;^ and^ the^ digging^ of^ the^ canal^ was^

(www.riftvalley.net).