The road to Mwanza was similar to around Singida not much change in the terrain
and we started seeing more trucks – like this beautifully pimped vehicle in the pic below
The inventive trading and bicycle transport entrepreneurs are worth keeping an eye out for
This house was pretty eye catching – just imagine what the owner’s truck would look like?
Sunflower oil was being sold at many villages – not sure who was buying it – there certainly looks like there was a big supply
So this sparked a mental journey which resulted in finding this info – we were driving in what is called the Central Corridor (http://www.tzdpg.or.tz/fileadmin/_migrated/content_uploads/WB_Zzen_Report_Sunflower_Tanzania_01.pdf)
Tanzania is one country among others in the world producing sunflower oilseeds for raw materials in processing cholesterol-free edible cooking oil with a by-product used as livestock feeds. Currently sunflower oil makes about 13% of the world edible oil production. Sunflower was introduced in Tanzania during colonial times and it was found to grow in almost
all parts of the country. Interestingly, the crop grows well in the dry weather conditions of the Central Corridor compared to other crops like maize and wheat. Sunflower in the Central Corridor is also interesting from a pro-poor or welfare perspective as most of the sunflower is grown by small farmers. In Dodoma, about 50% of farmers are engaged in oilseeds
production. With a population of about 43.7 million people, Tanzania’s minimum national demand for edible oil is expected to be about 219,000 tons per year, but the actual national demand is probably much higher, although there are no reliable figures available. Demand for vegetable oil is at least growing with the rate of population growth. The production of oilseeds
in Tanzania mainly focuses on ground nuts (40%), sunflower (36%), sesame (15%), cotton (8%),and palm oil (1%)
The Central Corridor is a transport and trading route located in East and Central Africa. Its end point is the Dar es Salaam, where it connects to the rest of the world via shipping. From Dar es Salaam, the corridor runs inland, serving the Tanzanian interior including its capital Dodoma and second city of Mwanza, as well as landlocked Rwanda and Burundi, and the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This route consists uses Tanzania’s Central Line as well as connecting road networks. The Central Corridor provides an alternative route to the ocean from Rwandan, Burundi and the DRC from the higher traffic Northern Corridor, which runs through Uganda and Kenya to the port of Mombasa.
Along the way we observed many painted rocks which initially looked like fancy graffiti but on closer observation it was adverts for Jambo food products
Jambo is very big in Tanzania (https://jambogroup.co.tz/)
So we got Mwanza and headed for the Yacht club which is highly recommended on iOverlander only to find a wedding was about to happen on the grass next to the club (where the campers can stay)
So initially we were disappointed but weddings do need to happen in beautiful venues so next best was Tunza Lodge which was not much further north so we headed north.