Zimbabwean adventure
When I first took over as Regional Manager for Southern Africa for County Commercial Cars Ltd., at the beginning of 1980, one of my first tasks was to get up to what was then Rhodesia to investigate the potential market for the company’s tractors.
The bush war had recently finished, and things were looking promising. Agriculture, industry and forestry had been starved of tractors and equipment for about seven years. I made several trips up to what is now Zimbabwe and things were moving fast, but it was not easy. Currency restrictions and many other things made it difficult, but the will was there to get things going again.
One of the obvious needs were big, powerful and modern tractors – nowhere more than in the huge sugar cane-growing area in the south-east of the country. I was working with the very dynamic Ford dealer/importer Duly & Co., which was a long-standing company in the country. It began as a bike shop and was the first to import a car, a Ford Model T, which is a fascinating story in its own right, as it was driven up from Cape Town to Rhodesia!
Duly and others were keen to get things going and showcase what was now available to the
