Themi

Tanzania is located between 1 and 12 degrees South of the equator.
The country is renowned for what people dig up. Even before Dr. Leaky uncovered Lucy and evidence of numerous pre-Homo Sapiens peoples, foreigners have come here to take the 885,800 sq. km. of land away. (The 61,500 sq. km. of water doesnt seem so attractive at present but I'm sure that will change.)
For example, it is the 4th largest gold producer in Africa, and thanks to Tanzania China International Mineral Resources Ltd (TCIMRL), the third largest African producer of iron ore. Coal, soda ash, gypsum, salt, phosphate, and lately graphite, (very large fields have been recently discovered, across the country,) are also extracted in large volumes. Enormous quantities of uranium are being exported with the help of Russia’s Uranium One Inc.
They have pretty stones as well: diamonds, amethyst, aquamarine, garnet, ruby, sapphire, tanzanite and tourmaline. "Tanzanite" is actually the mineral "blue zoisite". The Tiffany and Company marketing team thought this was too boring and trade marked the name "Tanzanite" for it, referencing the fact that it has been found nowhere other than Tanzania. Nice blue colour.
Its no wonder the Germans marched in and took over, followed by the British. Both of whom inhibited the creation of manufacturing industries that might compete with their own, limited the education of the people and excluded them from the civil service.
Despite the best efforts of Julius Nyere, who led the country into independence and whose vision of African family based socialism outlined in the famous Arusha Declaration, (famous here at any rate,) managed to annoy the capitalists, the socialists and the communists, the wealth of the country still today does not flow back to the 50 million inhabitants, most of whom rely of subsistance agriculture for their survival. 2017 figures show a labour force of 24.89 million, of which 66.9% was in agriculture, 26.6% in services / tourism and a paltry 6.4% in industry earning themselves a mean income of 2805 USD per annum. The UNDP Human Development index ranks them 159 out of 189 countries.
Julius can be lauded for many things, like improving the ratio of highest to lowest salaries from 50:1 in 1961 when the British left to 9:1 in 1976, but in my mind one thing stands out: he united the country without the bloodshed other African countries experienced. This is the most genetically and tribally diverse parts of Africa, reflecting the long time that people have been here. Starting 3.6 million years ago, our earliest known ancestors Australopithicine, wandered around Laetoli, closely followed by Homo Habilis in the Olduvai Gorge and they have been here ever since. . In modern Tanzania there are numerous tribes, covering all 4 main African language groups: Khoisan, (who arrived > 6000 years ago,) Cushitic, (who came from Ethipia 3-5000 years ago,) Bantu, (arriving 2000 years ago from the Niger delta,) and Nilotic speakers from the Sudan who came in the 15th - 18th C. One way he achieved this aim was by making Swahili, the lingua franca of the Omani run East Coast trading route, the offical language.
They managed to stay out of the clutches of the World Bank and the IMF until 1986, when the Western powers imposed "structural adjustment", driven by large aid donors who directed the Tanzanians into grand but unsuccessful development projects.
The financial sector in Tanzania has expanded in recent years and foreign-owned banks account for about 48% of the banking industry's total assets.
As an example - one which has been repeated all round the world - this road to Nairobi has been built with infrastructure development funds. As you can see from the massive traffic loads, it should be a dual carriageway and that is what has now been ordered. Unfortunately, most of the country has no feeder roads for they highway.
My motorbike is on the 10m access ramp and the standard road system can be seen. Graded, hardpacked road surfaces would not be a problem. These mud roads are simply scraped onto the bush and become unusable as soon as someone spits on them.
The drain on the side of the road in town is an example of the size required to keep the road surface relatively free from flooding or washouts.Read more