Recommendations Concerning Utilization. 
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several tons of tomatoes per week to the Transvaal, right through the winter; others do the same with cabbages, others with cauliflowers, and others send large 
quantities of rose and carnation flowers. Lourengo Marques with its higher mean temperature and shorter railage is in a better position but sends practically none. 
The soil is conducive to early maturity, and even if the manurial elements have in some places to be added the mechanical condition is right almost everywhere 
except in the few soils of stiff clay, ('lose intensive cultivation of comparatively small well selected areas (10 to 20 acres) will give better results in this direction 
than M’Shamba cultivation scattered over larger holdings, but of course a crop suitable to the particular place must be selected. Then, as to all ordinary fruits such 
as: — Oranges, Naartjes, Lemons, Pineapples, Avocada-Pears, Guavas, Waldo Peaches, Mangoes, Persimmons, Pawpaws, etc., selected early sites near Lourcngo 
Marques should give several weeks lead in all South African Markets; that is, the highest price and the surest market would be secured before competition is possible 
from elsewhere. For the local market the extended culture of other ordinary fruits is desirable, while the more tropical kinds, grown in limited quantity, may also 
find a market. Even fruit culture for export is worth consideration, for while the Natal export of citrus kinds begins only in June, the same kinds are practically 
finished at Lourengo Marques at that time and can thus fill the gap of one month before that date, during which Europe is badly supplied with these kinds. For 
general agriculture many sites are more or less suitable, for sugar cultivation only a very few so far as I have seen, and in regard to trees and fibre I will refer later. 
(e) . Limpopo Valley.— I regret that I did not see more of this valley, for what I did see, viz.:- up to Chai-Chai and for a good few miles beyond, is totally different to any- 
thing else seen in the Province, and so altogether superior that the surprise is that natives should have held it so long. A flat alluvial plain, extending as far as can 
be seen, and of width varying up to several miles, through which the Limpopo River winds its tortuous course at a depth only just sufficient to prevent overflow 
during heavy flood, and along the margin of which a narrow lake or marsh separates it from the foot-hills for a distance of many miles length, this valley forms 
probably the most fertile tract of large area in South Africa. With soil of great depth and first-rate quality, level enough throughout for steam c ultivation, for surface 
irrigation, and for tram transport, no other such valley exists in South Africa for the cultivation of sugar on an extensive scale, and where the facilities for preparation, 
cultivation, collection and manipulation are so abundant. Mr. David Cagi, whose farm adjoins Chai Chai, has a large area under lucern in good healthy condition, 
from which numerous crops had been cut and sent to the Transvaal. Without irrigation and even without deep culture this crop was excellent, and showed that a 
huge business in this line is practicable. But if lucern has its value for export it has an even higher value for eating off green, for which the sandy foothills adjoining 
the whole length of the valley and extending backward for a long distance ostriches and stock will probably give this in future a value corresponding with that of 
Oudtshoorn and the other small irrigated lucern fields of Cape Colony. Vegetables for local use arc also grown to perfection. But it is for sugar-cane particularly, 
and as the subject of highest importance, that I consider this valley suitable. From Chai-Chai for miles up and down the river, and back to the lake, and probably 
by easy drainage including much of the lake also, the conditions are more suitable than exist extensively anywhere in Natal or Zululand, and remind me in an 
enormously enlarged scale of the few best spots in the lower Umhlatuze Valley. One or several central mills in this plain, connected by rail tracks as well as by 
the river water-way, should convert a huge area round Chai-Chai into one large sugar-field, which extending outward as the demand arises, through the valley as a 
whole would do much more than supply the whole sugar consumption of South Africa. With no frost or drought, and with every condition suitable, the better 
varieties only should be grown, as the small and hard Uba cane so extensively used in Natal as the only possible kind on the unsatisfactory sites available there, 
cannot compare in weight of produce, sugar-content, or easy manipulation with the better kinds where these can be grown. 
Meantime the natives, who are abundant in the valley, cultivate mealies, Kafir-com, and the various Sorghums and I’anicums, with splendid results, as well as 
Earthnuts, Sesame, etc., and also collect Mafurra seeds for oil, the course of the river being marked out by the presence of Mafurera trees and thus visible from a 
distance. The municipality of Chai-Chai has imported a Fowler two-engine steam plough plant for hiring to local farmers. This I saw at work on the flats. 
(f) . Quisico and Inharreme . — These native districts consist of light and very sandy soil of great depth, usually without surface-water, but sufficiently moist to carty full 
crops of mealies, millets, etc., and to carry Cassiva everywhere. The population is not industrious (for natives) and it appears to me doubtful if the benefit derived 
from the export of men to the Transvaal would compensate for their absence, if transport for produce were available, or factories established locally. Considering 
the fresh ideas and troubles imported from the Transvaal with returning men it may be questioned whether the result will not eventually be very serious. But, given 
transport and central factories, these districts alone could, by native labour alone, produce a surplus of more than the total export of the Province, as that used to be 
a decade ago, before the present enormous decrease began. 
Mealies of an improved type would naturally be thought of as what the natives could most readily produce. But mealies arc bulky and heavy, and 
consequently the cost of transport even with railage, must be considerable. The more concentrated a product that can be produced, the more profitable is it likely 
to be. Starch from cassiva, cornflour, tapioca, arrow-root, and various oils, appear the most promising. The number of available oil-plants is very large, but it 
appears advisable rather to select a few and work these up in bulks than to try too many, except in experiment work. 
