Umguza is a district in the southern part of

Matabeleland North Matabeleland North is a Provinces of Zimbabwe, province in western Zimbabwe. With a population of 749,017 as of the Zimbabwean census, 2012, 2012 census, it is the country's second-least populous province, after Matabeleland South Province, Matab ...

province 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 Mozam ...

. It was formerly known as Esiphezini District.

Geography

Umguza District is bounded by Matopo and

Umzingwane Umzingwane is a village and seat of the Umzingwane District, in Matabeleland South province, in Zimbabwe. It has one of the most important railway stations in the nation, connecting the Beira–Bulawayo railway Beira-Bulawayo railway, also cal ...

districts in the southeast, Bulilima and Tsholotsho in the west, Kusile (formerly part of

Lupane District Lupane ( luːpɑːnɛ) District is located in the Matabeleland North Province of Zimbabwe, and it is also the Provincial Capital. The District is situated at an elevation of 976 m with a population of 198,600 inhabitants by 2019. Lupane Town ...

) in the north and

Bubi BuBi (officially: MOL BuBi) is a bicycle sharing network in Budapest, Hungary. Its name is a playful contraction Budapest and Bicikli ( bicycle in Hungarian), meaning "bubble" in an endearing manner. As of May 2019 the network consists of 143 doc ...

in the north and east. It surrounds the Bulawayo metropolitan area to the south on three sides.

Places in Umguza

* Ntabazinduna (Hill of the Chiefs) * Nyamandlovu a river valley where garden crops are raised.

Administration and politics

Umguza District is governed by the Umguza Rural District Council, which has its offices in Bulawayo. The district has one constituency, Umguza constituency, which was created out of the old Bubi-Umguza constituency. The constituency consists of the Nyamandlovu and Sawmills areas divided into fifteen wards.

Obert Moses Mpofu Obert Moses Mpofu is a Zimbabwean politician, who served as Minister of Home Affairs from 2017 to September 2018. Previously he was Minister of Macro-Economic Planning and Investment Promotion; Minister of Industry and International Trade; Minis ...

was elected in 1990 and 1995 as the member of parliament from Bubi-Umguza Constituency, the predecessor constituency. In 2008 and in 2013 he filled the parliamentary seat for the Umguza constituency. He did not run in 2018.

Economy

The climate in the district is arid and the primary occupation is animal ranching. Among recent problems are "land barons" establishing illegal settlements, established without any concern for services such as water and electricity. In the 2000s and early 2010s, about a dozen farmers in the district grew

tobacco Tobacco is the common name of several plants in the genus '' Nicotiana'' of the family Solanaceae, and the general term for any product prepared from the cured leaves of these plants. More than 70 species of tobacco are known, but the ...

on a commercial basis. However due to

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

, the rains became erratic and transport of the crop to the auction house in

Harare Harare (; formerly Salisbury ) is the capital and most populous city of Zimbabwe. The city proper has an area of 940 km2 (371 mi2) and a population of 2.12 million in the 2012 census and an estimated 3.12 million in its metropolitan ...

, nearly away became too expensive. As of 2019, there was no commercial tobacco farmer in Umguza District.

Energy

In July 2021, ''AF Power Private Limited'' an independent power producer (IPP) based in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

announced plans to design, develop, operate and maintain a 200 megawatt solar power plant, in Umguza District. The

Umguza Solar Power Station The Umguza Solar Power Station is a proposed 200 MW solar power plant in Zimbabwe. The project which will be developed in phases, will see 50 megawatts developed in the first phase. The rest of the project is expected to follow after about thre ...

, which will be built in phases in expected to add the first 50 megawatts to the national grid during 2022.

Notes and references

External links

* {{Geography of Zimbabwe, state=collapsed Districts of Matabeleland North Province Parliamentary constituencies in Zimbabwe