Physical Geography of SubSahara Africa

1
Physical Geography of Sub-Sahara Africa

• Sub-Sahara refers to Africa SOUTH of the Sahara
  desert.
• Includes almost 50 countries. One-third of all
  the countries on the earth.
• Extremely diverse landscape.
• 2nd largest continent has 9 million square miles
  of huge plateaus, mountains, and valleys south of
  the Sahara.

2
Continent of Plateaus

• One big Plateau
• Coastal plains go 20 miles inland.
• Plateau after plateau in between there are
  escarpments.
• Escarpments- steep cliffs or slopes.
• South East hold steepest escarpments.
• B/C of plateau Africa has the highest overall
  elevation

3
Mountains

• Atlas in Northwest.
• Most mts. east side.
• Drakensberg, Ruwenzori.
• Volcanoes Mount Kenya, Mount Kilimanjaro,
  Africas highest peak (19,340 feet)

4
Great Rift Valley

• Stretches from Jordan river to Zambezi River in
  Mozambique.
• Occurred when pangaea ripped apart creating
  mountains.

5
Water Systems

• Largest lakes cut into Great Rift Valley.
• Longest rivers all rise in plateaus.
• Due to high escarpments, rapids and waterfalls
  are common on the edge of the continent.

6
Lakes

• Lake Victoria in GRV, 2nd largest freshwater lake
  in the world, source of White Nile.
• Lake Tanganyika (420 miles) 1st largest lake in
  world.
• Lake Malawi in GRV
• Outside GRV Lake Volta, Lake Chad (no natural
  outlet-loses water through evaporation.

7
Rivers

• 4 great rivers slice through Africa
• Nile
• Congo (largest river system sub-Sahara)
• Niger
• Zambezi (plunges down a huge chasm known as
  Victoria Falls, which is twice the size of
  Niagara falls)

8
Natural Resources

• Diamonds form the D.R.O.T. Congo.
• Gold from South Africa GRV.
• Nigeria 3 of worlds known oil.
• Uranium, manganese, cobalt, zinc, copper.

9
Climate Vegetation

• Three tropical latitudes cross sub-Sahara Africa.
• T of Cancer crosses south of Sahara Desert
• T of Capricorn extends through southern tip.
• Equator runs through center. (All Africa within
  35 degrees of equator)
• B/C sub-Sahara is all in the tropics makes for
  diverse climate and vegetation.

10
Deserts

• Deserts cover a larger percentage of Africa than
  any other continent.
• Sahara covers north.
• Namib desert, coast of Namibia.
• Kalahari desert most of Botswana.

11
The Sahel
Looking south

• Sahel means border.
• Lies between the desert and fertile grassland to
  the south.
• Long, dry seasons wet seasons.
• Drought has brought famine, misery, hardship.
• Countries Senegal, Mauritania, Mali, Burkina
  Faso, Niger,
• Nigeria, Chad, Sudan, and the Horn.
• Desertification happening in the Sahel. Sahara
  taking over.

Looking north
12
Tropical Savanna Tropical Rain Forests

• T.S. more rain than Sahel, supports livestock and
  game.
• T.S. Holds the Serengeti plains and Nairobi
  national park.
• T.R.F. covers only 8 of Africa, on the equator.
• T.R.F. faces destruction from logging companies.
• T.R.F. make poor farmland.
• T.R.F. cocoa, rubber, palm-oil.