The population of Africa

Africa is a huge continent,the population of which is very uneven and does not correspond to its size at all. The reason for this is in the peculiarities of its history and geography. Most of the continent is occupied by two deserts - Kalahari and Sahara, in which a person can not live. In addition, a long slave system and colonial domination also influenced the uneven settlement of inhabitants.

At present, the population of Africa isabout a billion people. A large part of it is concentrated around the basins of large rivers: Congo, Nile, Senegal, Niger, on the Mediterranean coast and the Gulf of Guinea. The most densely populated state is Nigeria, where one square kilometer is about a thousand people.

The population of Africa is constantlyThe average age of its residents is getting younger. At the moment, most of the Africans are people younger than 15 years. The process of increasing the population in Africa is much more intensive than in other continents. Scientists predict that by the middle of this century, the population of Africa will be one-fourth of the total population of the planet.

On this continent live representatives of three main races: equatorial, Caucasoid and Mongoloid. The overwhelming majority of the inhabitants are representatives of indigenous peoples.

Europeans are mainly peopleNorth Africa - these are Arabs and Berbers who live in the territory of Algeria, Morocco and Egypt. Outwardly they can be distinguished by dark skin, dark eyes and hair, narrow nose, elongated skull and oval face.

The representatives of Negroes predominate south of the Sahara- the African branch of the equatorial race, which can differ significantly from one another in the shade of the skin, the size and shape of the skull, facial features, physique and height.

For example, the highest Negroids are tribesTutsi and Himni, who live in the savannah in northern Africa. Their growth is on the average 180-200 cm. And in another region of the continent, in the equatorial forests, there live small pygmies - their growth does not exceed 150 cm.

In the western part of the continent, most often there are stocky, athletic-built people, and the distinctive feature of the inhabitants of the upper reaches of the Nile is a very dark, almost blue-black skin color.

In the deserts and semi-deserts of the southern part of the continentthe tribes of Bushmen and Hottentots live. They are distinguished by a yellowish skin color and a flat face, therefore they resemble Mongoloids. These nationalities are mostly undersized and thin-boned. Ethiopians, many scientists refer to some intermediate race. Their skin is light, with a reddish tinge, and the appearance speaks of proximity to the southern branch of Europeans. The inhabitants of Madagascar are Malagasy, they represent a mixture of Mongoloids and Negroids.

The former population of Africa, whose numberit is mostly Europeans, and they live in places with the most favorable climate. Thus, in the northern part of the mainland, along the Mediterranean coast, in the former colonies of France, many Europeans of French origin can be found. And in the south of the mainland, there are white Afrikaners - the descendants of the Dutch and English who moved here centuries ago.

Most African peoples have veryancient culture. In Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, five to seven thousand years ago, handicrafts, construction, science, religion developed, and the monuments of architecture of those times still impress with their monumentality.

The population of Africa has a long way of developmentand made an invaluable contribution to the global development. Now, after the end of a protracted period of colonial domination, African culture is beginning to develop again.

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