Africa facts for kids

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Africa
World map showing where Africa is
Area	11,730,000 sq mi (30,400,000 km²) (2nd)
Population	1,275,920,972 (2018; 2nd)
Population density	94/sq mi (36/km²)
GDP (nominal)	$2.45 trillion (2019; 5th)
GDP (PPP)	$7.16 trillion (2019; 5th)
GDP per capita	$1,930 (2019; 6th)
Demonym	African
Countries	54 (and 2 disputed)
Dependencies	External (1) Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Internal (6) Canary Islands Ceuta Madeira Mayotte Melilla Réunion
Languages	1250–3000 native languages
Time zones	UTC-1 to UTC+4
Largest cities	Largest urban areas: Cairo Lagos Kinshasa Johannesburg Luanda Khartoum Dar es Salaam Abidjan Alexandria Nairobi Cape Town Kano Dakar Casablanca Addis Ababa

Africa is the second largest continent in the world (after Asia). It makes up about one-fifth of the world's land. It is surrounded by large areas of water. There are 54 fully recognized and independent countries in Africa, and 16.72% (1.4 billion) of the world's population lives there. It is thought to be the continent where the first humans evolved.

History
Climate
- Rainfall
Plants and animals
Politics
People
Countries
African diaspora
Key facts about Africa
Other pages
Images for kids
See also

History

Civilizations before European colonization.

The history of Africa begins from the first modern human beings and leads to its present difficult state as a politically developing continent.

Africa's ancient historic period includes the rise of Egyptian civilization, as well as the further development of societies outside the Nile River Valley and how they interacted with civilizations outside of Africa. In the late 7th century, Islam spread to North and East Africa. That led to the appearance of new cultures such as those of the Swahili people, and the Mali Empire, whose king, Mansa Musa, became one of the richest and most influential people of the early 14th century. This also led to an increase in the slave trade that had a very bad influence on the development of the whole continent until the 19th century.

Slavery

For more details, see African slave trade

Slavery has long been practiced in Africa. Between the 7th and 20th centuries, the Arab slave trade took 18 million slaves from Africa via trans-Saharan (across the Sahara) and Indian Ocean routes.

Between the 15th and the 19th centuries (500 years), the Atlantic slave trade took an estimated 7–12 million slaves to the New World.

Between 1808 and 1860, the British Navy captured approximately 1,600 slave ships and freed 150,000 Africans who were aboard.

Areas of Africa under the control or influence of European nations in 1914 (at the outbreak of World War I).

Colonialism

In the late nineteenth century, Europe took over much of the land and created many colonial and dependent territories. They left only three fully independent states: Darwiish State, (also spelled Daraawiish State), Ethiopia (known to Europeans as "Abyssinia"), and Liberia.

Egypt and Sudan were never formally merged into any European colonial empire. However, after the British occupation of 1882, Egypt was effectively under British control until 1922.

Modern history

African independence movements had their first success in 1951 when Libya became the first former colony to become independent. Modern African history has been full of revolutions and wars. The African economy has grown and countries have become democratized.

A civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (formerly Zaire) began in 1998. Neighboring African countries have become involved. Since the conflict began, 5.5 million are estimated to have died as a result of it.

Political associations such as the African Union offer hope for greater co-operation and peace between the continent's many countries.

Climate

Biomes of Africa

From north to south, Africa has most types of climate. In order from north to south, they are:

Alpine and mediterranean climate
Dry sandy desert
Fairly dry savannah (grassland)
Rain forest
More grassland
More deserts
Table Mountain

Running northeast to the south is the East African Great Rift Valley. This has mountains, volcanoes, deep rifts and valleys, rivers, and lakes.

Rainfall

The rainshadow concept, but with the wind coming from the west

This picture shows where vegetation is most common in February and August (before and after the summer).

Most of North Africa is made up of the Sahara Desert: it is dry and hot and does not receive much rain. Rivers and water sources are scarce in Saharan Africa. Underground water sources, such as springs are very important in the desert. These often form oases. An oasis is an area of vegetation (plant life) surrounded by desert.

There are two rain shadows that are responsible for the Sahara Desert. In that part of the world, the wind comes mainly from the east. That does bring rain, but the Himalayas and the Tibetan Plateau block the monsoon rain and prevent it from getting to North Africa. Also, the Atlas Mountains near the north coast of Africa prevent rain from coming in from the north.

Conditions and winds are different further south, where huge amounts of rain fall near the equator. The equator runs across the middle of Africa (see the red line drawn on the map). That means much of Africa is between the two tropics:

Plants and animals

This oasis in Libya is surrounded by plant life.

Africa has many types of wildlife. In particular, it is now the only continent that has many native species of large mammals. Some of them occur in very large numbers. There are antelope, buffalo, zebras, cheetahs, elephants, lions, giraffes, rhinoceros, apes, hyenas, and many more. Over 2,000 types of fish live in African lakes and rivers.

Politics

The African Union (AU) is an International organization. It was created to help maintain peace among Africa's many countries. It has a parliamentary government, known as the African Union Government, consisting of legislative, judicial, and executive parts. It is led by the African Union President and Head of State, who is also the President of the Pan African Parliament. A person becomes President of the AU by being elected to the PAP and then gaining majority support in the PAP.

Extensive human rights abuses still occur in several parts of Africa, often under the direction of the state. Most of such violations occur for political reasons, often as a side effect of civil war. Countries where major human rights violations have been reported in recent times include Uganda, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Sudan, Zimbabwe, and Côte d'Ivoire.

People

People who come from Africa are called Africans. People north of the Sahara are called Maghrebis and people south of the Sahara are called Subsaharans. Languages in eastern Africa include Swahili, Oromo, and Amharic. Languages in western Africa include Lingala, Igbo and Fulani. The most populated country in Africa is Nigeria.

Countries

Country	Area (mi²)	Population	Year	Density (per mi²)	Capital
Northern Africa
Algeria	919,595	45,377,509	2022	48	Algiers
Canary Islands (Spain)	2,893	2,153,389	2019	740	Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Santa Cruz de Tenerife
Ceuta (Spain)	7.1	85,144	2018	12,000	—
Egypt	384,345	106,055,142	2022	266	Cairo
Libya	679,362	7,051,429	2022	10	Tripoli
Madeira (Portugal)	309	251,060	2021	810.7	Funchal
Melilla (Spain)	4.7	86,384	2018	18,000	—
Morocco	172,317	37,754,017	2022	214	Rabat
Sudan	681,489	45,822,691	2022	64	Khartoum
Tunisia	59,985	12,057,040	2022	197	Tunis
Western Sahara	102,703	625,647	2022	6	El Aaiún
Horn of Africa
Djibouti	8,950	1,015,699	2022	22	Djibouti
Eritrea	38,996	3,641,048	2022	91	Asmara
Ethiopia	386,102	120,452,406	2022	298	Addis Ababa
Somalia	242,217	16,747,831	2022	66	Mogadishu
East Africa
Burundi	9,915	12,573,322	2022	1,199	Bujumbura
Comoros	719	905,308	2009	1,210	Moroni
Kenya	219,746	56,054,400	2022	245	Nairobi
Madagascar	224,632	29,063,124	2022	123	Antananarivo
Malawi	36,402	20,082,733	2022	526	Lilongwe
Mauritius	784	1,275,836	2022	1,623	Port Louis
Mayotte (France)	145	285,503	2022	1,884	Mamoudzou
Mozambique	303,623	32,943,169	2022	103	Maputo
Réunion (France)	965	907,630	2022	928	Saint-Denis
Rwanda	9,525	13,571,073	2022	1,360	Kigali
Seychelles	178	99,521	2022	554	Victoria
South Sudan	235,890	11,446,739	2022	47	Juba
Tanzania	342,009	63,013,471	2022	175	Dodoma
Uganda	77,147	48,525,005	2022	593	Kampala
Zambia	287,024	19,376,272	2022	64	Lusaka
Zimbabwe	149,364	15,280,042	2022	100	Harare
Central Africa
Angola	481,353	34,836,632	2022	68	Luanda
Cameroon	182,514	27,819,516	2022	145	Yaoundé
Central African Republic	240,534	4,991,649	2022	20	Bangui
Chad	486,180	17,334,293	2022	34	N'Djamena
Republic of the Congo	131,854	5,779,882	2022	42	Brazzaville
Democratic Republic of the Congo	875,313	94,809,089	2022	102	Kinshasa
Equatorial Guinea	10,830	1,491,816	2022	130	Malabo
Gabon	99,487	2,326,964	2022	22	Libreville
São Tomé and Príncipe	371	227,004	2022	591	São Tomé
Southern Africa
Botswana	218,816	2,443,156	2022	11	Gaborone
Lesotho	11,722	2,174,990	2022	183	Maseru
Namibia	317,874	2,629,611	2022	8	Windhoek
South Africa	468,376	60,750,322	2022	127	Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Pretoria
Swaziland	6,641	1,183,323	2022	175	Mbabane
West Africa
Benin	43,537	12,735,234	2022	278	Porto-Novo
Burkina Faso	105,638	22,008,021	2022	198	Ouagadougou
Cape Verde	1,556	567,629	2022	327	Praia
Côte d'Ivoire	122,780	27,637,309	2022	215	Abidjan, Yamoussoukro
Gambia	3,907	2,547,523	2022	618	Banjul
Ghana	87,854	32,323,235	2022	354	Accra
Guinea	94,873	13,819,375	2022	138	Conakry
Guinea-Bissau	10,857	2,057,657	2022	181	Bissau
Liberia	37,189	5,286,815	2022	136	Monrovia
Mali	471,118	21,375,017	2022	43	Bamako
Mauritania	397,955	4,885,222	2022	12	Nouakchott
Niger	489,075	25,895,281	2022	49	Niamey
Nigeria	351,650	215,987,465	2022	586	Abuja
Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha (United Kingdom)	151	6,112	2022	40	Jamestown
Senegal	74,336	17,594,382	2022	225	Dakar
Sierra Leone	27,869	8,289,685	2022	286	Freetown
Togo	21,000	8,652,723	2022	394	Lomé
Africa Total	11,447,338	1,402,538,258	2022	117

African diaspora

Countries with significant African descendents outside Africa:

Haiti: 98%
Saint Kitts and Nevis: 96.9%
Anguilla: 91.4%
Bahamas: 86.1%
Barbados: 81.1%
Jamaica: 76.3%
Dominican Republic: 71.1%
Cayman Islands: 60.0%
Trinidad and Tobago: 39.5%
Cuba: 34.9%
Turks and Caicos: 34.0%
Belize: 29.8%
Venezuela: 24.0%
Panama: 22.0%
Colombia: 21.0%
Brazil: 13-19%
United States: 12.9%
Puerto Rico: 6.9%
Argentina: less than 2%

Key facts about Africa

Africa is the second-largest continent (after Asia) in the world with 54 countries.
Africa is surrounded by large areas of water.
Africa's climate varies from desert to rainforest. The desert is in the northern part of Africa and the rainforest is in the middle near the equator. The rest of Africa is mountains or grasslands.
Africa has many different kinds of wildlife, each living in a climate that is best for them.
Africa has been influenced by Egyptian civilization and by Islam.
Slavery has been practiced in Africa for centuries. The Arab slave trade took 18 million slaves from Africa and the Atlantic slave trade took 7-12 million slaves to the New World.
In the late 19th century, different European powers occupied many of the countries in Africa.
In 1951, Libya became the first former colony to become independent.
The African Union was made to help keep the peace among Africa's many countries.

Other pages

Images for kids

The totality of Africa seen by the Apollo 17 crew
Lucy, an Australopithecus afarensis skeleton discovered 24 November 1974 in the Awash Valley of Ethiopia's Afar Depression
Saharan rock art in the Fezzan
The Ezana Stone records King Ezana's conversion to Christianity and his subjugation of various neighboring peoples, including Meroë.
The intricate 9th-century bronzes from Igbo-Ukwu, in Nigeria displayed a level of technical accomplishment that was notably more advanced than European bronze casting of the same period.
Ruins of Great Zimbabwe (flourished eleventh to fifteenth centuries)
Topography of Africa
Today, the African Plate is moving over Earth's surface at a speed of 0.292° ± 0.007° per million years, relative to the "average" Earth (NNR-MORVEL56)
Savanna at Ngorongoro Conservation Area, Tanzania
African countries by GDP (PPP) per capita in 2020
A map showing religious distribution in Africa
The rock-hewn Church of Saint George in Lalibela, Ethiopia is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Nok figure (5th century BC-5th century AD)
A musician from South Africa
Best results of African men's national football teams at the FIFA World Cup