African Overview

8/14/2019 African Overview

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Slavery and Africa



•Existed in early years in Africa in a

small way



•Arabs took slaves to Middle East,

1200’s



•Portugal began taking slaves in 1441



•Greatest number taken from the

continent during 1600’s and 1700’s



•Ended in Europe and Americas in mid-

1800’s



• Continued in Arab

world until late 1800’s

• Still legal inMauritania (northwest

Africa) until 2007

• Still practiced illegally

in Sudan



European Colonial Rule of Africa



• Began in 1880’s to gain resources and trade

advantages

• All of Africa colonized by World War Oneexcept for Liberia and Ethiopia

• Did harm to Africa

--broke up cultures

--created artificial boundaries

--gave foreign countries control over African

decisions

--tied Africa’s economy to world needs



• Did some good for

Africa

--built modern roadsand ports

--brought education

--improved health care



Independence



• By mid-1960’s U.K, Belgium, and France

had freed all their colonies

• Portugal held colonies until 1975

• Now all of Africa is independent nations

governed by native Africans



Political Problems Since

Independence



• Too many ethnic groups under one

government

• Large ethnic groups divided betweencountries

• Landlocked countries

• One party governments or military

dictatorships



Natural Resources of Africa

(Five countries - South Africa, Libya,

Nigeria, Algeria, and Zambia - control80% of Africa’s mineral exports)



• diamonds



• gold



• copper



• oil



• rivers (40% of world’s

hydro-electric

potential)



• forests



Reasons for lack of industrial

development in Africa



• Raw materials are exported

• No money to invest in factories

• Shortage of educated and skilled workers



Agriculture in Africa



•On grasslands

-- animal grazing

-- cattle, sheep, goats

-- nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle



•Plantation farming

-- East - coffee, tea, corn



-- West - cacao, palm oil,

bananas, yams



-- South of Sahara -

cotton, peanuts



-- South Africa - sugar

cane, fruit, grapes



•Subsistence farming

-- grow just enough to

feed themselves

-- often “slash and burn”QuickTimeª and a

TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressorare needed to see this picture.



Africa’s Geographical Problems



• Few natural harbors

• Falls and rapids make rivers unnavigable

• Tropics breed disease

• Poor thin soil

• Lacks wide continental shelf -- little off-

shore oil, poor fishing

• Often experiences droughts

African Overview

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