Transcript Africa - Pamela West`s blog

Africa
Physical Geography
2nd Largest Continent
is a huge continent – from east to
west , its widest point is the same distance
between Moscow and NYC (4,000 miles).
 Africa
 North
and south distance is the same as
the distance between northern Alaska and
the Panama Canal – 5,000 miles.
Factors of Isolation
1.
Almost all unbroken and irregular
coastlines…few natural harbors for ships to
anchor for trade and exploration.
2.
Most rivers have falls and rapids because of
the elevation – people could not sail up the
rivers to explore.
3.
The Sahara is the largest desert in the world
(bigger than the US). More rocky than sandy.
Prevented movement between northern Africa
and southern Africa
The Plateau Continent
 A huge
plateau covers much of Africa
 Most of the continent is 1000 feet above
sea level
Rift Valleys and Lakes
East Africa:
continental shift created huge cracks
in East Africa
 land sank, formed long, thin rift valleys
 stretch 4,000 miles from Jordan to
Mozambique
 eastern part is still slowly pulling away from
Africa
Rift Valleys and Lakes

Long, deep lakes
form at bottoms of rift
valleys
 Lake Tanganyika is
longest freshwater
lake in world
 Lake Victoria is
Africa’s largest; sits in
basin between rift
valleys
Rivers and Waterfalls
 Most African
rivers contain many
waterfalls, rapids and gorges making them
useless for transportation
 Congo River: largest network of
waterways but has 32 waterfalls
 Victoria Falls: 2 times the height of
Niagara Falls

On the Zambezi River
Mountains
 Africa
mainly
has volcanic
mountains:
Mount Kenya
and Mount
Kilimanjaro
Resources
 Africa’s
resources makes it the world’s
richest continent



Gold (30%)
Platinum (80%)
Chromium
 Africa’s
Cobalt (42%)
Copper
Diamonds (50%)
countries have not benefited from
these resources because colonial powers
exported much of it to Europe.
 Libya, Nigeria and Algeria are among the
world’s leading petroleum producers