Down the Congo 



industry. Secondly may be mentioned the surprising in- 

 crease in the output of diamonds by the Belgian-American 

 Company, the Forminiere, which is likely to reach 250,000 

 carats in 1921, and the number of new " finds " that their 

 prospectors have made. 



But this is not aU, for in Monsieur Franck, Belgium 

 would seem to have had a Colonial Minister with an imperial 

 mind, and, what is quite as necessary, imagination. The 

 results of his African tour are already bearing fruit. He 

 has in the first place put his finger on the key-note of suc- 

 cessful colonial enterprise, viz., rail and river transport. 

 His policy includes the immediate construction of another 

 line between Matadi and Kinshasa ; reorganisation of the 

 upper river steamer service and additional steamers for the 

 lower Congo and its tributaries, as well as a large steamer 

 for Lake Tanganyika ; and the construction of warehouses 

 and facilities for handling cargo where congestion has occurred 

 previously — ^large brick -warehouses being now practically 

 Complete at Stanlejrville, Ponthierville, Kabalo and Albert- 

 ville. Lastly comes the important construction scheme of 

 the Lower Congo — the Katanga Railway and the joining up 

 of Joko Punda (the navigation terminus on the Kasai River) 

 with the present rail-head at Bukama. This section is only 

 eight hundred kilometres in length, and as construction 

 plans are complete the usual hesitation inseparable from 

 railway projects should be quickly overcome. The more 

 far-reaching, the grander scheme of the Lobito Bay Railway 

 has by no means been lost sight of, and the final survey of 

 the 650 kilometres from Fungurumi and along the Congo- 

 Zambezi divide to the valley of the Upper Kasai has lately 

 been completed by Belgian engineers. 



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