North Africa: Physical Features, Environment, and Trade

- Physical features

The 5 countries of North Africa lie along the Mediterranean coast from Morocco in the west to Egypt, Shaimaa's home, in the east. The world's largest hot desert, the Sahara, covers much of north africa. Temperatures can be extremely high during the day but cool or even cold at night. Life in the Sahara centers around oases. Life in the Sahara centers around oases. An oasis is a place in a desert where water can be found.

Tha atlas mountains run through Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia. The country of Egypt gets almost to rain. It is about 96% desert. The nile travels through its valley north from eastern africa and sudan to the mediterranean sea, splitting Egypt in 2. A delta is a flat plain formed on the seabed where a river deposits material over may yars. One part of this region, Egypt Sinai Peninsula, sits between asia and africa. The peninsula is a mountanious desert separated, from Africa by the suez canal. 

- North Africas environment

In 1964, the egyptian goverment built a dum cross the nile river called the "aswan high dum". Egyptian farmers relied an annual floods to bring fertile soil to their fields. Fortunately, fish stocks have recovered in recent years to near what they were before the dum was built. Egypt, Libya has also made serious changes to its environment. The libyan government has built pipelines to carry water to the coast. The water is used to irrigate farmland and support growing coastal cities, where 4 out of every 5 libyans now live. Herders allow their goats to eat grass in an area down to the roots. With these roots, there is nothing left to hold the soil in place.

- Resources and trade

water and oil are the most important natural resources in north africa. The nile river flows through several countries before it reaches Egypt.

cotton - fruits - olives - citrus - other crops are important export.

Oil

Although north africa does not produce as much oil as parts of southwest asia, every nation in the region has enough to satisfy its own needs and to export, or sell abroad. Most of north africa's oil and natural gas reserves are found in inland, in the heart of the sahara.

- The suez canal

The canal was built in Egypt in 1869. The canal makes traveling by sea between asia and europe shorter by thousands of miles. The canal is good for Egypt, too, since it collects a fruits from each skip that passes through.

- Crossroads of continents

North africa's closeness to europe, asia and africa south of the sahara has helped shape life there for thousands of years. North africa and southern europe have had connections across the mediterranean for thousands of years. The country of israel, in southwest asia, shares a land border with Egypt. North Africa's majority religion and language both came from southwest asia.

- Living in a day place

North africa's population is increasing rapidly. Cities are large and expading.

- Settlement patterns

Almost all egyptians live near the coast or in the mountains. A small population lives in the sahara. Others are nomads, people who move from place to place without a permanent name.

- cities

north africa is experiencing urbanization. Urbanization happens when people in an area move into cities and those cities grow larger. Cairo, the capital of Egypt, is the largest city in africa and home to more than one in five egyptians. It is egypt's economic, political, and educational center.

the trend of urbanization is even stronger in the western part of the region. More than half of all moroccans, tunisians and algerians live in cities, as do more than 3/4 of libyans, many cities are severely overcrowded.