Kakamas | |
---|---|
![]() A water wheel in Kakamas | |
Coordinates: 28°48′S20°39′E / 28.800°S 20.650°E | |
Country | South Africa |
Province | Northern Cape |
District | ZF Mgcawu |
Municipality | Kai !Garib |
Established | 1898 |
Area | |
• Total | 4.55 km2 (1.76 sq mi) |
Elevation | 670 m (2,200 ft) |
Population (2011) [1] | |
• Total | 9,538 |
• Density | 2,100/km2 (5,400/sq mi) |
Racial makeup (2011) | |
• Black African | 7.0% |
• Coloured | 81.6% |
• Indian/Asian | 0.9% |
• White | 9.6% |
• Other | 1.0% |
First languages (2011) | |
• Afrikaans | 93.5% |
• Tswana | 2.3% |
• English | 1.6% |
• Other | 2.7% |
Time zone | UTC+2 (SAST) |
Postal code (street) | 8870 |
PO box | 8870 |
Area code | 054 |
Kakamas [2] is a town founded in 1898 and located in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, on the banks of the Orange River.
Originated as at a place where the Orange River could be relatively easily crossed. The spot was first known as Bassonsdrif. In 1898 a proper settlement was established and under the auspices of the Dutch Reformed Church the area was developed as an agricultural spot. It became a municipality in 1954. [3]
The small town of Kakamas was built on the sheer hard work and determination of a couple of impoverished stock farmers at the end of the 19th century. The drought of 1895–97 was followed by an outbreak of rinderpest, leaving many farmers destitute.
In 1897, the Dutch Reformed Church started a "colony" on the farms Soetap and Kakamas on the banks of the Orange River for white people who had lost everything as a result of the drought [4] .
Ignoring the criticism of qualified engineers about their building methods, the farmers continued to construct the water canals by hand that are still used today to supply the town and surrounding area with water for irrigation. For their efforts, they were each awarded the right to one of the irrigation plots. The men worked extremely hard even taking the yoke themselves, rather than wasting precious time in launching a time-consuming search for oxen and donkeys grazing somewhere in the veld.
The exceptional dry piling of the stone along rocky slopes can still be seen today. By dry piling instead of excavating through rock, the farmers were able to cut the overall costs of the canals considerably.
The ingenuity of the workers under the leadership of Japie Lutz is aptly demonstrated in the workmanship at the water tunnels in the northern canal. Mr Piet Burger perfected the water wheel that was widely used in Kakamas. This pumping device almost led to a court case about patent rights, when a blacksmith who used to live in Kakamas registered the patent in 1922.
The Commission that ran the "colony" planned ahead and in 1912 building operations on a hydro-electric power station and turbine in the northern canal were started. Ultimately the power station, built to look like an Egyptian temple, generated enough electricity that Kakamas liaised with Upington about the possibility of supplying Upington with electricity as well.
The economy of this town is based on farming, and thanks to irrigation from the Orange River farmers from the Kakamas area are now prime exporters of table grapes to Europe and England. The region also exports peaches, dried fruit, raisins, oranges and dates.
The name Kakamas was originally given to a drift that was known as Takemas or T’Kakamas since 1779. The name means "place of the raging cow" – probably referring to an incident when a raging cow stormed the Korana while they were herding their cattle through this ford.
To some the town's name originates from the Khoi word "gagamas" (brown), referring to the red clay of the area with which women daub their faces. To most, though, Kakamas is a Korana word meaning "poor pasture".
Today, the name reflects poorly on a fertile valley in the Lower Orange River, graced with vineyards, cotton and lucern fields.
Kakamas has numerous schools. Among them is Martin Oosthuizen High School which held their centennial celebrations in 2020. (www.hmoskool.co.za). Other schools include:
Laerskool Sentraal
Laerskool Oranje-Suid
Laerskool Kakamas
Laerskool Lutzburg
Hoërskool Kakamas
South Africa occupies the southern tip of Africa, its coastline stretching more than 2,850 kilometres from the desert border with Namibia on the Atlantic (western) coast southwards around the tip of Africa and then northeast to the border with Mozambique on the Indian (eastern) coast. The low-lying coastal zone is narrow for much of that distance, soon giving way to a mountainous escarpment that separates the coast from the high inland plateau. In some places, notably the province of KwaZulu-Natal in the east, a greater distance separates the coast from the escarpment. Although much of the country is classified as semi-arid, it has considerable variation in climate as well as topography. The total land area is 1,220,813 km2 (471,359 sq mi). It has the 23rd largest Exclusive Economic Zone of 1,535,538 km2 (592,875 sq mi).
The Orange River is a river in Southern Africa. It is the longest river in South Africa. With a total length of 2,432 km (1,511 mi), the Orange River Basin extends from Lesotho into South Africa and Namibia to the north. It rises in the Drakensberg mountains in Lesotho, flowing westwards through South Africa to the Atlantic Ocean. The river forms part of the international borders between South Africa and Lesotho and between South Africa and Namibia, as well as several provincial borders within South Africa. Except for Upington, it does not pass through any major cities. The Orange River plays an important role in the South African economy by providing water for irrigation and hydroelectric power. The river was named the Orange River in honour of the Dutch ruling family, the House of Orange, by the Dutch explorer Robert Jacob Gordon. Other names include simply the word for river, in Khoekhoegowab orthography written as !Garib, which is rendered in Afrikaans as Gariep River with the intrusion of a velar fricative in place of the alveolar click, Groote River or Senqu River, derived from ǂNū "Black". It is known in isiZulu as isAngqu.
The Northern Cape is the largest and most sparsely populated province of South Africa. It was created in 1994 when the Cape Province was split up. Its capital is Kimberley. It includes the Kalahari Gemsbok National Park, part of the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park and an international park shared with Botswana. It also includes the Augrabies Falls and the diamond mining regions in Kimberley and Alexander Bay.
Upington is a town founded in 1873 and located in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, on the banks of the Orange River. The town was originally called Olijvenhoutsdrift, due to the abundance of olive wood trees in the area, but later renamed after Sir Thomas Upington, Attorney-General and then Prime Minister of the Cape. It originated as a mission station established in 1871 and run by Reverend Christiaan Schröder. The mission station now houses the Kalahari Orange Museum. The museum is also the home of a donkey statue, which recognises the enormous contribution that this animal made to the development of the region during the pioneering days of the 19th century.
Kuruman is a small town in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. It is known for its scenery and the Eye of Kuruman, a geological feature that brings water from deep underground. The abundance of water produces an unexpected swathe of green amidst the barren plains and is known as the "Oasis of the Kalahari". It was at first a mission station of the London Missionary Society founded by Robert Moffat in 1821. It was also the place where David Livingstone arrived for his first position as a missionary in 1841. The Kuruman River, which is dry except for flash floods after heavy rain, is named after the town.
San Luis Dam, also known as B.F. Sisk Dam, is a major earth-filled dam in Merced County, California, which forms San Luis Reservoir, the largest off-stream reservoir in the United States. The dam and reservoir are located in the Diablo Range to the east of Pacheco Pass and about 10 miles (16 km) west of Los Banos. San Luis Dam, a jointly-owned state and federal facility, stores more than 2 million acre feet (2.5 km3) of water for the California State Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project. Although the dam is located in the valley of San Luis Creek, the majority of its water comes from man-made aqueducts which are supplied from other rivers in Northern California.
A reservoir is an enlarged lake behind a dam, usually built to store fresh water, often doubling for hydroelectric power generation.
Desdunes is a commune that is part of the Dessalines Arrondissement in Haiti's Artibonite Department. It is located in the great Artibonite Plain, in the heart of the rice granary of Haiti. The population was 37,027 at the 2015 census. Rice production is the driving force of the local economy.
Mexico, a classified arid and semi-arid country, has a total land area of 2 million square kilometres, 23% of which is equipped for irrigated agriculture. The agricultural sector plays an important role in the economic development of the country accounting for 8.4 of agricultural gross domestic product (GDP) and employing 23% of the economically active population. Irrigated agriculture contributes about 50% of the total value of agricultural production and accounts for about 70% of agriculture exports. Mexico's government initiated a number of structural reforms in the water sector aimed to introduce modern water management and irrigation.
Kenhardt is a small town in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. This little town is about 120 km from Upington, the largest town in the area.
//Khara Hais Local Municipality was a local municipality in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. It fell within the ZF Mgcawu District Municipality and governed the town of Upington and surrounding rural areas. As of 2011 the municipality had a population of approximately 93,500 people, and covered an area of 21,780 square kilometres (8,410 sq mi). The unusual spelling of the name comes from the original transcription of the Khwe language name, where the click consonant became "//".
The battle of Kakamas took place in Kakamas, Northern Cape Province of South Africa on 4 February 1915. It was a skirmish for control of two river fords over the Orange River between contingents of a German invasion force and South African armed forces. The South Africans succeed in preventing the Germans gaining control of the fords and crossing the river.
Keimoes is a town in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. It lies on the Orange River and is about halfway between Upington and Kakamas.
The Waseges River is a river that rises on the slopes of the Nyandarua Plateau below the Aberdare Range in Kenya. The river flows north, then west and south to enter Lake Bogoria in the Great Rift Valley from the north after passing through a swamp. In 2002 rubies were found in the region of the Waseges River.
Irrigation in India includes a network of major and minor canals from Indian rivers, groundwater well based systems, tanks, and other rainwater harvesting projects for agricultural activities. Of these groundwater system is the largest. In 2013–14, only about 36.7% of total agricultural land in India was reliably irrigated, and remaining 2/3 cultivated land in India is dependent on monsoons. 65% of the irrigation in India is from groundwater. Currently about 51% of the agricultural area cultivating food grains is covered by irrigation. The rest of the area is dependent on rainfall which is most of the times unreliable and unpredictable.
Askham is a village in the Dawid Kruiper Local Municipality in the ZF Mgcawu District Municipality in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. Askham lies not far from the confluence of the mostly dry Molopo and Kuruman Rivers in the Red Kalahari Desert, about 200 km north of Upington at the junction of the R31 and the R360 roads.
The Koegas atrocities or Koegas affair (1878–80) was a notorious murder case in the Cape Colony, which led to deep political divisions and a follow-up campaign, due to the perceived racial bias of the country's Attorney General. It culminated in libel suits, filed by the government against several liberal leaders and news outlets.
Iranamadu Tank is an irrigation tank in northern Sri Lanka, approximately 3 mi (5 km) south east of Kilinochchi.
The Vaalharts Valley is located in the north-east corner of the Northern Cape province of South Africa, bordering the North West province. It gets its name because it is located between two rivers, the Vaal and the Harts. Because of its advantageous position between the two rivers, an irrigation scheme was built in the Vaalharts Valley in the 1930s.
The ǃKora Wars was a period of raiding by the ǃKora people and subsequent military action by the Boer authorities. The mid-nineteenth century experienced migration as a result of the protracted frontier wars that forced the movement of certain indigenous groups further north of the Cape Colony. These included the Khoisan, the Basters and the ǃKora, a people whom the colonial authorities considered more of a bandit community. The ǃKora were known to loot communities living around the lower to middle Orange River. The raids increased in volume and intensity during the mid eighteen hundreds. This forced the authorities to launch a series of expeditions aimed at countering the raids. The ǃKora were finally stopped in 1879, but their intimate knowledge of the Gariep rendered them the most significant threat to settler colonies outside of the Bantu nations at the time.