Colleen Bawn is a town in

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and ...

Location

Colleen Bawn is located in

Gwanda District Gwanda District is located in Matabeleland South Province of Zimbabwe. Its administrative seat is Gwanda, the biggest city of the province. The main language spoken by the people from Gwanda is Sotho. The center is Gwanda Gwanda is a to ...

, in

Matabeleland South Province Matabeleland South is a province in southwestern Zimbabwe. With a population of 683,893 as of the 2012 Zimbabwean census, it is the country's least populous province. After Matabeleland North, it is Zimbabwe's second-least densely populated p ...

, in southwest Zimbabwe. It is approximately , by road, east of

Gwanda Gwanda is a town in Zimbabwe. It is the capital of the province of Matabeleland South, one of the ten administrative provinces in the country. It is also the district capital of Gwanda District, one of the seven administrative districts in ...

, the provincial and district headquarters. This is about , by road, southeast of

Bulawayo Bulawayo (, ; Ndebele: ''Bulawayo'') is the second largest city in Zimbabwe, and the largest city in the country's Matabeleland region. The city's population is disputed; the 2022 census listed it at 665,940, while the Bulawayo City Council ...

, the nearest large city. This location lies on Highway A-6, the main road between Bulawayo and Beitbridge, at the international border with the Republic of South Africa. The coordinates of the town are:21° 0' 0.00"S, 29° 12' 36.00"E (Latitude:21.0000; Longitude:29.2100). Colleen Bawn lies at an average elevation of , above

mean sea level There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the '' ari ...

Overview

Colleen Bawn is supplied with water from ''Geelong Weir'' on the

Mzingwane River The Mzingwane River, formerly known Umzingwane River as or Umzingwani River is a major left-bank tributary of the Limpopo River in Zimbabwe. It rises near Fort Usher, Matobo District, south of Bulawayo and flows into the Limpopo River near Beitb ...

, fed by releases of water from ''Silalabuhwa Dam'', on the tributary

Insiza River The Insiza River is the principal tributary of the Mzingwane River in Zimbabwe. It rises near Fort Rixon, Insiza District, and flows into the Mzingwane River near West Nicholson. Hydrology The upper reaches of the Insiza River are ephemeral, ...

. The town grew up around the ''Colleen Bawn'' gold mine. The prospector who pegged claim to the mine in 1895, named it after an Irish girl with whom he had been acquainted. The mine was opened in 1905 but after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

became the focal mineral in the area. The limestone is mined by ''Pretoria Portland Cement'', who operate a cement factory on the site and have been responsible for recent growth in the town.

Population

According to the 1982 Population Census, Colleen Bawn had a population of 1,427. In 2004, the population of the town was estimated at 2,545. As of 2020, the population of the town was estimated at 2,492 inhabitants.

Economy

The Pretoria Portland Cement company, is planning to construct a 32 megawatts solar power plant at the location of its cement manufacturing factory in Colleen Bawn. 16 megawatts of the output of

Colleen Bawn Solar Power Station The Colleen Bawn Solar Power Station is a solar power plant under development in Zimbabwe. The project is owned by Pretoria Portland Cement Limited, who own a cement factory in Colleen Bawn and plan to consume 16 megawatts of the electricity ...

will be consumed by the cement factory, and the remainder will be sold to the Zimbabwean national electricity grid.

References

External links