Texas of South Africa (Vryburg, North West province nickname)

Vryburg (in the North West province of South Africa) is South Africa’s largest cattle-farming area and is often called the “Texas of South Africa.” The landscape is similar to West Texas and the Panhandle area of Texas.
 
The nickname “Texas of South Africa” has been in use since at least the 1980s.
 
     
Wikipedia: Vryburg, North West
Vryburg (free fort) is a large agricultural town situated in the North West Province of South Africa.
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Vryburg is South Africa’s largest beef producing district, with Hereford cattle the most popular. It is sometimes called “the Texas of South Africa”.
 
Vryburg, South Africa
Population: 28,000
The country round Vryburg is flat, arid and bare, and few visitors venture into this “Texas of South Africa” - so called because it is the largest cattle-farming region in South Africa. For the farmers in the surrounding area Vryburg is an important shopping and business center, and it has a number of factories which process the produce of the region.
   
Welcome to Vryburg - South Africa
We particularly specialize in agricultural land/property - as Vryburg enjoys the status of being the “Texas of South Africa”.
     
South Africa Regions and Towns
NORTH-WEST
(...)
The province also includes Stellaland, in the Vryburg area, described as the “Texas of South Africa”, where large cattle farms and game ranches are to be found. The province abounds in resorts, game lodges, guest houses and bed & breakfast accommodation.
 
BMW Motorrad South Africa
Vryburg remains prosperous cattle-farming country, and peering through an insect-bespattered helmet visor at its main street, another bit of magnified folklore re-casts itself in my imagination; memories again from the 50’s - a bronzed, ‘be-boeped’ farmer hoisting his magnificent belly into the constraining loop of a tortured, sweat-stained leather belt, announces to a circle of proud country-men at a koek-sister bring-and-buy behind the old stone town hall, that “Vryburg is the Texas of South Africa.”
 
“Well, jeez,” retorts Cronje, lurching the BMW onto its side-stand at the filling station on the corner of Market and de Kock Streets, “it’s changed hey. What a dilapidated place. A bit like Texas, I suppose.” 
 
Africa Kosher Safaris
North West Province
Often dubbed “The Texas of South Africa”, this ranch country contains one of South Africa’s premier Safari areas, the Pilanesberg National Park, the “Sun City” entertainment complex, the scenic Magaliesberg mountain range and Hartebeespoort Dam, and numerous other tourist delights. 
 
North West province
Agriculture
North West is sometimes referred to as the Texas of South Africa, with some of the largest cattle herds in the world found at Stellaland near Vryburg, The Marico region is also cattle country, while the areas around Rustenburg and Brits are fertile, mixed-crop farming land.
 
The province is an important food basket in South Africa. Maize and sunflowers are the most important crops and the North West is the major producer of white maize in the country. 
     
Google Books
South African Panorama
South African Information Service
Volume 26
1981
Pg. 46:
... thus making it possible for the cattle farms of the Vryburg district to prosper into one of the best cattle areas in the entire Republic today,  the Texas of South Africa.

Google Books
Disconnected: Haves and Have-nots in the Information Age
by William Wresch
New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press
1996
Pg. 155:
Vryburg proudly announces itself as the “Texas of South Africa.”
     
Google Groups: alt.railroad.steam
Newsgroups: alt.railroad.steam
From: “GJW Plimmer”