Physical Features of Africa
This enormous desert covers much of northern Africa.
What is the Sahara Desert?
This country is located in northeastern Africa and is home to the Nile Delta and the pyramids of Giza.
What is Egypt?
This huge lake in eastern Africa is one of the sources of the Nile River.
What is Lake Victoria?
The process in which productive land becomes increasingly dry and desert-like is called this.
This African region generally has the lowest population density because of extreme heat and lack of water.
What is the Sahara?
This major river flows north through Sudan and Egypt before reaching the Mediterranean Sea.
What is the Nile River?
This West African country contains the mouth of the Niger River and is Africa’s most populous country.
What is Nigeria?
This river curves through West Africa and is especially important to countries such as Mali and Nigeria.
What is the Niger River?
Cutting down large numbers of trees without adequately replacing them is called this.
What is deforestation?
This region has grasslands and seasonal rainfall that can support farming, livestock, and larger populations than the Sahara.
What is the savanna?
This physical region forms a transition zone between the Sahara Desert and the wetter savanna to the south.
What is the Sahel?
This East African country borders the Indian Ocean and contains part of the Great Rift Valley.
What is Kenya?
This powerful Central African river flows through the tropical rain forest and eventually reaches the Atlantic Ocean.
What is the Congo River?
Farmers remove trees to create farmland. Without the tree roots, rain washes away nutrients from the ground. What environmental problem is getting worse?
What is poor soil?
(What is soil erosion) - also acceptable
Why do many African cities and settlements develop near rivers and lakes?
They provide water for drinking, farming, transportation, industry, and trade.
This mountain, located in Tanzania near the Kenyan border, is the highest mountain in Africa.
What is Mt. Kilimanjaro?
This large Central African country contains much of the Congo River basin and tropical rain forest.
What is the Democratic Republic of the Congo?
These mountains are located in northwestern Africa, especially Morocco and Algeria.
What are the Atlas Mountains?
Explain one way water pollution can hurt agriculture in Africa.
Polluted water can damage crops, contaminate irrigation supplies, harm livestock, or reduce the amount of usable water for farming.
Dense vegetation, heavy rainfall, and difficult road construction can make transportation and trade challenging in this African biome.
What is the tropical rain forest?
This enormous geological feature stretches through eastern Africa and was formed by tectonic activity pulling sections of Earth’s crust apart.
What is the Great Rift Valley?
Name two countries that share a border with each other along the Nile in northeastern Africa.
What are Egypt and Sudan?
This desert is located in southern Africa, mainly in Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa.
What is the Kalahari Desert?
A community in the Sahel experiences years of overgrazing, loss of vegetation, and drought. Explain the likely environmental result.
The soil becomes less fertile, vegetation disappears, erosion increases, and desertification spreads.
Two areas have similar temperatures. Area A has reliable rainfall and access to a major river. Area B has little rainfall and few permanent water sources. Which area will probably have the larger population, and why?
Area A, because reliable water supports drinking, agriculture, industry, transportation, and settlement.