Kapunga -- The rice farm

I took a trip to a BIG rice farm in our area which is run by some South Africans.   It was a really nice trip.  We talked with a couple of the South Africans and then took a brief tour of the plant and farms.  We are hoping they will work out a contract with us for rice at a good price.  As you can imagine the mission purchases a lot of rice each month.

You will see many rice paddies in different stages of development.  The land in each paddy has to be very flat and even in order to flood the field and all areas receive adequate water supply.

This farm has water rights for several miles.  They have a huge irrigation canal which runs along side many of their rice paddies.  Then their are irrigation ditches off of the canal into each paddy which they can open and shut as needed for each paddy.

I wasn't certain why, but some fields were being worked by many people and others were being worked by few.

This is the rice plant and big storage areas.  We toured the plant and were able to watch the rice being sifted, cleaned, polished and bagged.  I did not understand all that was being said due to the loud machines, but it was still interesting to see.

 

 

 

 

This farm sells all over Tanzanian and also to bordering countries.  They have lots of big equipment like tractors and backhoes.  It was amazing.

 

 

This last picture is of a cross which was placed at the scene of the truck accident we took care of a couple of weeks ago.  If you remember 3 people died at the scene, 1 at our hospital and 138 people were treated for severe head and face lacerations.