by the damping and storage effects of Lake Albert, Lake Edward and Lake Kyoga. The Sudd, a vast area of swampland, stretches downriver from Mongalla to near the point where the Sobat River joins the White Nile just upstream from Malakal. Due to evaporation, only half the water that enters the Sudd at Mongalla emerges from the northern end of the swamps. The much smaller Badigeru Swamp lies about to the east, separated from Mongalla by a region of open grassland. The belt along the Nile about 10 km wide and 146 km long from Mongalla to Bor is inhabited by the Mundari and Dinka peoples. Economic development The district commissioners initiated the development of cotton at Mongalla in the 1920s and 1930s, but the price paid for Mongalla cotton fell from 50 piastres per kantar in 1929–30 to 18 piastres in 1931 and the industry failed to develop as planned.The "Southern Scales", which defined the rates of pay for officials and workers in the southern provinces of Sudan, were extremely low, making it impossible for the administrators to undertake any development such as a school, hospital or economic projects. Use of money was restricted, and even in 1945 taxes were still being paid in kind. In 1937 J.C. Myers was commissioned to undertake a botanical survey of Mongalla province, later extended to all of Equatoria. In contrast to the pessimistic view of the south taken by the Khartoum administration, he was enthusiastic about the wealth and diversity of plants. He noted that the people had adapted to cultivating non-native plants such as cassava, maize, sweet potato and groundnuts. He also noted that the government was restricting commercial development of sugarcane, tobacco and coffee, which grew wild, and thus preventing economic development. In 1938 Governor Symes made a tour of Equatoria and left with "contempt intensified". He consistently rejected schemes for development. An experimental station was established to grow sugar at Mongalla in the 1950s, and there were plans to establish commercial operations. However, after independence in 1956 the Khartoum government shifted the sugar project to the north, where it is grown under much less favorable conditions with heavy irrigation. After the First Sudanese Civil War ended in 1972, there were plans to revive sugar production at Mongalla, and although Mongalla Sugar Processing Factory operated on a low-scale in the 1970s, it ceased production when civil war broke out again