Tanzania

Tanzania

Capital: Dodoma

Official languages: Swahili, English

Population: 66.62 million

Tanzania is an East African country known for its vast wilderness areas. They include the plains of Serengeti National Park, populated by the “big five” game (elephant, lion, leopard, buffalo, rhino).

Kilimanjaro National Park, home to Africa’s highest mountain. Offshore lie the tropical islands of Zanzibar, with Arabic influences, and Mafia, with a marine park home to whale sharks and coral reefs.

The Tanzania mainland is bounded by Uganda, Lake Victoria, and Kenya to the north, by the Indian Ocean to the east, by Mozambique, Lake Nyasa, Malawi, and Zambia to the south and southwest, and by Lake Tanganyika, Burundi, and Rwanda to the west.

The rural settlements—and life in them—changed drastically after the nationalization of land in 1964 and subsequent agricultural reforms. By 1970, large plantations of cloves and coconuts, once almost exclusively the property of fewer than 50 Arab families, had been redistributed. The production of food crops, especially rice, is being encouraged. Fishing villages are still important in the east.

The city of Zanzibar is still primarily a Muslim town, although the distinctive mode of life and culture, reminiscent of an Eastern commercial centre, has almost disappeared since the downfall of the Arab oligarchy in 1964. The hub of civic life is moving from Stone Town with its narrow lanes to a new town with modern buildings and amenities at Ngambo, the former African quarter. Kilimani, Bambi, and Chaani are being developed into new rural towns; a similar change is taking place in Pemba at Mkoani, Chake Chake, and Wete.