$6000 tractor for Tanzania

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 34031, 20 December 1975, Page 2

$6000 tractor for Tanzania

A small, enthusiastic band of parishioners got together about six months ago and decided to raise S6OOO for a tractor for a leperhospital farm in Tanzania. Yesterday, they saw the tractor on its way from Cashin Quay. The tractor, a small allpurpose machine, will be used to develop 600 acres belonging to the Humbolo Leprosy Hospital, about 100 miles inland from the Tanzanian port of Dar-es-Salaam. The parishioners are members of the Anglican parish of St Johns, Woolston, led by a vestryman at the church, Mr P. M. Jones, who was host to the tractor’s new owner, Mr G. Hart, when he was home on furlough early this year. Mr Jones’s first plan was to talk 40 men into giving SIOO each, but once the fundraising had started he got supporters so fast that he accepted money in whatever amounts it came in.

The manager of the tractor division at Sockbum Motors (Mr J. M. Snook), who has helped several groups supply tractors to development projects overseas, had several tractors at predevaluation prices, and offered to hold one for the group until it had enough money to buy. The pre-devaluat ion price

was a saving of $6OO, and the gift of a safety frame by the firm was another saving of $l3O. Spare parts to the value of $B2 were also given for nothing. Arrangements were made with a travel agent, A. R. Guthrey Travel and Shipping, Ltd, and the shipping line to ship the tractor free — a saving to the fund-raisers of about $lOOO. Negotiations through the Government, the New Zealand aid officer in Tanzania, and the Tanzanian Government, resulted in duty free entry — another saving of about $BOO.