Portal:Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surface area. With nearly 1.4 billion people as of 2021, it accounts for about 18% of the world's human population. Africa's population is the youngest among all the continents; the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. Despite a wide range of natural resources, Africa is the least wealthy continent per capita and second-least wealthy by total wealth, ahead of Oceania. Scholars have attributed this to different factors including geography, climate, corruption, colonialism, the Cold War, and neocolonialism. Despite this low concentration of wealth, recent economic expansion and a large and young population make Africa an important economic market in the broader global context. Africa has a large quantity of natural resources and food resources, including diamonds, sugar, salt, gold, iron, cobalt, uranium, copper, bauxite, silver, petroleum, natural gas, cocoa beans, and.
Africa straddles the equator and the prime meridian. It is the only continent to stretch from the northern temperate to the southern temperate zones. The majority of the continent and its countries are in the Northern Hemisphere, with a substantial portion and a number of countries in the Southern Hemisphere. Most of the continent lies in the tropics, except for a large part of Western Sahara, Algeria, Libya and Egypt, the northern tip of Mauritania, and the entire territories of Morocco, Ceuta, Melilla, and Tunisia, which in turn are located above the tropic of Cancer, in the northern temperate zone. In the other extreme of the continent, southern Namibia, southern Botswana, great parts of South Africa, the entire territories of Lesotho and Eswatini and the southern tips of Mozambique and Madagascar are located below the tropic of Capricorn, in the southern temperate zone.
Africa is highly biodiverse; it is the continent with the largest number of megafauna species, as it was least affected by the extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna. However, Africa also is heavily affected by a wide range of environmental issues, including desertification, deforestation, water scarcity, and pollution. These entrenched environmental concerns are expected to worsen as climate change impacts Africa. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has identified Africa as the continent most vulnerable to climate change.
The history of Africa is long, complex, and varied, and has often been under-appreciated by the global historical community. In African societies, the historical process is largely a communal one, with eyewitness accounts, hearsay, reminiscences, and occasionally visions, dreams, and hallucinations, crafted into oral traditions and preserved orally. Truth is generally viewed as relativist. Africa, particularly Eastern Africa, is widely accepted to be the place of origin of humans and the Hominidae clade, also known as the great apes. The earliest hominids and their ancestors have been dated to around 7 million years ago, including Sahelanthropus, Australopithecus africanus, A. afarensis, Homo erectus, H. habilis and H. ergaster, the earliest Homo sapiens (modern human) remains, found in Ethiopia, South Africa, and Morocco, date to circa 233,000, 259,000, and 300,000 years ago, respectively, and Homo sapiens is believed to have originated in Africa around 350,000–260,000 years ago. Africa is also considered by anthropologists to be the most genetically diverse continent as a result of being the longest inhabited. (Full article...)
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Did you know (auto-generated) -
- ... that after erecting the African Union headquarters, the Chinese government was accused in 2018 of spying on the building for five years?
- ... that Albert Luthuli was the first African to win the Nobel Peace Prize?
- ... that after Benjamin Moloise's execution, the extremist group Direct Action bombed two Paris companies linked to South Africa in protest?
- ... that Agri-Expo is the oldest agricultural society in Africa?
- ... that a 1939 thesis by Nathaniel Fadipe, The Sociology of the Yoruba, was the first sociological study by a black African?
- ... that makwerekwere is the South African equivalent of "barbarians", an offensive and derogatory slur used to refer to foreigners?
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Selected biography –
Jason Sendwe (1917 – 19 June 1964) was a Congolese politician and the founder and leader of the General Association of the Baluba of the Katanga (BALUBAKAT) party. He later served as Second Deputy Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (then Republic of the Congo) from August 1961 until January 1963, and as President of the Province of North Katanga from September 1963 until his death, with a brief interruption.
Sendwe was born in 1917 in Mwanya, Kabongo Territory, Belgian Congo, to a ethnic Baluba family. He was educated in Methodist schools and nursing institutions. Unable to become a doctor due to a lack of medical schools in the Congo, he found work as a minister, teacher, and nurse. He became involved in several cultural organisations, and in 1957 founded BALUBAKAT to fight for the interests of the Baluba. He espoused Congolese nationalism and believed that the Congo should remain a united country after Belgian rule. In May 1960, shortly before the country's independence, he was elected to the newly constituted Chamber of Deputies. Sendwe sought to obtain control over the government of Katanga Province, but lost to a power struggle against his rival, Moïse Tshombe, and the Confederation of Tribal Associations of Katanga (CONAKAT) party. Regardless, Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba nominated him for the office of State Commissioner for Katanga. (Full article...)Selected country –
Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Guinea on the north and Liberia on the south, with the Atlantic Ocean on the west. The name Sierra Leone was adapted from the Portuguese name for the country: Serra Leoa, literally "Lion Mountain Range".
During the 18th century, Sierra Leone was an important center of the transatlantic trade in African slaves. The capital Freetown was founded in 1787 by the Sierra Leone Company as a home for formerly enslaved African Americans who had fought for the British in the American Revolutionary War. In 1808, Freetown became a British Crown Colony, and in 1896, the interior of the country became a British protectorate.
The Crown Colony and Protectorate joined and gained independence in 1961. From 1991 to 2002, Sierra Leone suffered greatly under the devastating effects of rebel activities, which were stopped by UN and British forces disarming 17,000 militia and rebels. Sierra Leone has been at peace since 2002. (Read more...)
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Dakar (/dɑːˈkɑːr, dæ-/ UK also: /ˈdækɑːr/; French: [dakaʁ]; Wolof: Ndakaaru) is the capital and largest city of Senegal. The department of Dakar has a population of 1,278,469, and the population of the Dakar metropolitan area was at 4.0 million in 2023.
Dakar is situated on the Cap-Vert peninsula, the western-most point of mainland Africa. Cap-Vert was colonized by the Portuguese in the early 15th century. The Portuguese established a presence on the island of Gorée off the coast of Cap-Vert and used it as a base for the Atlantic slave trade. France took over the island in 1677. Following the abolition of the slave trade and French annexation of the mainland area in the 19th century, Dakar grew into a major regional port and a major city of the French colonial empire. In 1902, Dakar replaced Saint-Louis as the capital of French West Africa. From 1959 to 1960, Dakar was the capital of the short-lived Mali Federation. In 1960, it became the capital of the independent Republic of Senegal. Dakar will host the 2026 Summer Youth Olympics. (Full article...)In the news
- 12 February 2024 –
- Two boats collide on the Congo River near Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo; with the death toll remains unclear. (AP)
- 11 February 2024 – 2023 Africa Cup of Nations
- In association football, hosts Ivory Coast win their third Africa Cup of Nations by defeating Nigeria 2–1 in the final. Sébastien Haller scores the winning goal in the 81st minute. (The Guardian)
- 10 February 2024 – Somali civil war
- Four Emirati soldiers and a Bahraini military officer are killed, while ten other people are injured, when a soldier opens fire at a military base in Mogadishu, Somalia, before being killed in the ensuing shootout. Al-Shabaab claims responsibility. (AP)
- 10 February 2024 –
- A Eurocopter EC130 helicopter crashes near Nipton, California, United States, killing all the six people on board, including Nigerian banker Herbert Wigwe. (CBS News)
- 10 February 2024 – 2023–2024 Senegalese protests
- Violent protests occur in Senegal following an announcement by President Macky Sall that presidential elections have been delayed from February 25 to December 15. (Sky News)
- 9 February 2024 –
- At least 18 people are killed during a collision between a bus and a truck on a road in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. (AP)
Updated: 16:33, 14 February 2024
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More did you know –
- ...that from 1926 to 1940, the Union Minière du Haut Katanga had a virtual monopoly of the world uranium market?
- ...that Anfillo is an endangered language of Western Ethiopia, spoken only by a few hundred adults above sixty?
- ...that Bono Manso, the capital of Bono state, was an ancient Akan trading town in present-day Ghana, which was frequented by caravans from Djenné as part of the Trans-Saharan trade?
- ...that Reverend John Chilembwe is celebrated as the first Malawian nationalist, and was a martyr for his cause?
Related portals
Major Religions in Africa
North Africa
West Africa
Central Africa
East Africa
Southern Africa
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