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Source: CIA World Factbook |
The Republic of Chad is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It borders Libya to the north, Sudan to the east, the Central African Republic to the south, Cameroon and Nigeria to the southwest, and Niger to the west.
Due to its distance from the sea and its largely desert climate, the country is sometimes referred to as the "dead heart of Africa". In the north, it contains the Tibesti Mountains, the largest mountain chain in the Sahara desert. Chad was formerly part of the Federation of French Equatorial.
Chad has four climatic zones: it has broad, arid plains in the center, desert in the north, dry mountains in the northwest and tropical lowlands in the south. Only 3% of Chad is arable land and none of it has permanent crops. Environmental hazards in Chad include hot, dry, dusty harmattan winds in the north, periodic droughts, and locust plagues.
Lake Chad, which is in Chad and Cameroon, was once the second-largest lake in Africa but has shrunk dramatically during the last few decades and is now down to less than 10% of its former size. The people of Chad are known as Chadian. Chad covers 1,284,000 square kilometers.[more...]
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