Ten Interesting Facts About Africa August 2, 2016 – Posted in: Travel – Tags: , , ,

 

Ten Things You Didn’t Know About Africa

Africa has been referred to as the dark continent. This is a reflection of ignorance about Africa, rather than a reflection of the continent itself. Below are some interesting facts about Africa which you probably didn’t know

  1. Africa is larger than the United States, China, India, Argentina, and western Europe combined. The Sahara desert alone is bigger than the continental USA.
  2. There are 56 sovereign countries on the continent. The newest country is South Sudan which became independent from Sudan on July 9, 2011
  3. There are numerous climate types on the continent, including tropical, savanna, and desert
  4. Between 2100 and 3000 languages are spoken on the continent, roughly a quarter of all languages spoken in the world
  5. The current population is around 1 billion people
  6. Both the equator (zero degrees latitude) and the Prime Meridian (zero degrees longitude) pass through Africa
  7. The most populous country in Africa is Nigeria with about 150 million people
  8. The southernmost point of the continent is Cape Agulhas in South Africa, not the Cape of Good Hope.
  9. In the 12th century, Timbuktu in Mali was home to 3 universities attended by about 25,000 students
  10. Africa has the highest free-standing mountain, Mt. Kilimanjaro, which stands at 19,341 ft above sea level in Tanzania.

africa map