Page 353 - Truncal States to UAE_Neat

Chapter Eight

Fayah in Sharjah. Three hundred acres of land were irrigated, and
planted with fruit trees, lucerne and vegetables, with the intention of
handing over sections to tribesmen of the area, many of whom would
continue to lead a semi-nomadic life. But the latter part of the Milaihah
project was not achieved during the lifetime of the Development
Office. The federal Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, which took
over this project, inherited the technical inadequacies of the scheme;
they found that there was no assured market near enough and that
most of the settlers preferred to earn a regular wage rather than face
the risks inherent in owning their own plot.128
Perhaps the most useful contribution which the Development
Office made to the improvement of agriculture in the area was
through its agricultural school. This was established in September
1967 in place of the primary school which had been run by the
Diqdaqah station since the 1950s. The school ran a two-year course
in agriculture for students who had completed intermediate
schooling. In 1970 five students graduated all taking posts with the
Development Office, and in the following school year, the last under
the Development Office, there were 24 students and 3 Palestinian
teachers at the school.

Surveys
Before any large-scale agricultural projects could be undertaken in
the area it was essential to commission surveys to determine the
nature and availability of ground water, and to investigate the
various soil types of the area. Therefore the first sum of money which
the British Government gave for development in the Trucial States in
1952 included funds for a Water Resources Survey; a second survey
in 1959 was carried out under the auspices of the UN Technical
Assistance Branch. Any local farmer would himself classify the
various areas bearing in mind the availability of water. The
properties of the soil in the mountain foreland, the wadis and the
desert borders play an equally important role in the siting of new
farms and the selection of crops to be raised there.
From the outset the Development Office concentrated on gathering
information in surveys before engaging on a project, and inevitably
the majority of these surveys were hydrological.129 The British firm of
consultants, Sir William Halcrow and Partners, which had worked in
Dubai since the 1950s, made another groundwater survey in 1965
which was commissioned by the British Government. This firm
328