Barakat, Sudan

Barakat is a town in Al Jazirah state, Sudan. It lies on the west shore of the Blue Nile to the south of Wad Madani.

Barakat
Barakat
Coordinates: 14.314122°N 33.534372°E / 14.314122; 33.534372
CountrySudan
StateAl Jazirah
Elevation
386 m (1,266 ft)

The extra long staple cotton named Sudan Barakat is planted in the irrigated fields of this region.[1] Sudan Barakat, which is entirely handpicked, is considered to be one of the world's highest quality cottons.[2] A 6,000 feddan pump irrigation scheme was started at Barakat in 1914.[3] The plan was launched by a group of English weaving companies called the Sudan Plantation Syndicate, which had already started a successful pump scheme at Taiba (Ţayyibat Ḩamad an Nīl) in 1910.[4] The town is home to the headquarters of the Sudan Gezira Board, which runs the Gezira-Managil Irrigation System.[5] A light railway runs through Barakat, used for carrying the cotton harvest.[6]

The village of Shakaba is nearby. After the Battle of Karari (2 September 1898), in which the Mahdist forces of the Khalifa were defeated by an Anglo-Egyptian army under General Herbert Kitchener, the Mahdi's family was sent to Shakaba under government escort. After hearing a rumor that the group was conducting Mahdist propaganda, a force of government troops fired on the group at random, killing Khalifa Muhammad Sharif and two of the Mahdi's sons, al-Fadil and al-Bushra. A third son, Abd al-Rahman al-Mahdi, was badly wounded.[7]

References
  1. "Sudan Barakat". Paul Reinhart AG. Archived from the original on 2011-10-03. Retrieved 2011-08-28.
  2. "Sudanese Barakat Cotton". Light Years IP. Archived from the original on 2011-09-07. Retrieved 2011-08-28.
  3. Tim Niblock (1987). Class and power in Sudan: the dynamics of Sudanese politics, 1898-1985. SUNY Press. ISBN 0-88706-481-7.
  4. Paul Philip Howell; John Anthony Allan (1994). The Nile: sharing a scarce resource : a historical and technical review of water management and of economic and legal issues. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-45040-3.
  5. Andrew D. Roberts; John Donnelly Fage; Roland Anthony Oliver (1984). The Cambridge history of Africa, Volume 8. Cambridge University Press. p. 875. ISBN 0-521-22505-1.
  6. William R. Jobin (1999). Dams and disease: ecological design and health impacts of large dams, canals and irrigation systems. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 0-419-22360-6.
  7. Gabriel Warburg (2003). Islam, sectarianism, and politics in Sudan since the Mahdiyya. Univ of Wisconsin Press. p. 81. ISBN 0-299-18294-0.
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