Mpanda

Mpanda is a city in the Katavi Region in the far west of Tanzania and the administrative centre of both the region and Mpanda District. It is a frontier town, roughly 500 kilometres north of Mbeya and 380 kilometres south-west of Tabora, and an important centre for marketing and transshipping rice and maize. The Katavi Region was created in 2012 by splitting the Rukwa Region, and it is attracting gold prospectors. Mpanda is also the staging point for Katavi National Park, whose headquarters lie 35 kilometres south at Sitalike. It is the end of a rail line from Tabora, its roads to Sumbawanga, Tabora and Kigoma are unsealed, and its airport was upgraded to a two kilometre sealed runway in 2012. It became the seat of a Catholic diocese in 2000 and of the Anglican Diocese of Lake Rukwa in 2010.