Sudan is a country in Northern Africa, bordering the Red Sea and is bordered by the countries (going counter-clockwise) Egypt, Libya, Chad, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Eritrea. It's exact location is 1500 N, 3000 E, and it is about one fourth the size of the United States. The largest country in Africa, its total area is 2,505,810 square kilometers, and only 5% of that is water, and only 7% of the land is irrigated; Sudan has an envirnomental issue with its quota of portable water. Its climate is a little more tropical in the south (because it is closer to the equator), and its northern climate is dryer and hotter, which makes sense because the northern half is all desert. In addition to oil, Sudan has small amounts of gold, iron, copper, chromium ore, tungsten, silver, hydropower, mica, and zinc. Besides droughts, Sudan also gets dust storms (mostly in the northern part), and its animal population is threatened because of all of the excessive hunting going on (because of the hunger and poverty of many of the Sudanese people- 40% of the Sudanese people live below the poverty line) and the occasional droughts that stop what little rain there is from nourishing plants. Sudan's industry includes both edible and non-edible oils, cotton, sugar, soap distilling, textiles, cement, shoes, and automobile and truck assembly.
The state of Darfur has an area of 493,180 square kilometers (Darfur is about 20% of Sudan), and is in western Sudan. Except for the volcanic Marrah Mountain range, the state is mostly a plateau, but because it does take up area in both the north and the south, it goes with Sudan's north/south climates pretty closely. About three-fourths the size of Texas, it has 7.4 million people, which is roughly 26% of the country's population (Sudan has a total of 26 million people). Compared to Texas's population, though, Darfur has MUCH less people (Texas alone has 22 million). Like most of Sudan, Darfur's economy is based off of the production of agricultural goods like cereal, fruits, tobacco, and in the northern part, livestock. There are actually three sub-states of Darfur, too: Gharb Darfur, Janub Darfur, and Shamal Darfur.
Last updated: Tuesday, May 30, 2006 11:21 AM
Created: Thursday, May 18, 2006 11:30 AM
By Ariel L., Percy Julian Middle School