Kenya
Published on Nov 20, 2015
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Kenya
History of Kenya
Eastern Africa may have provided the setting for the earliest development of the human species. Archaeologists working in the Rift Valley region, beginning with Mary and Louis Leakey in the 1930s, have unearthed fossils of several species of protohumans dating to as much as 20 million years ago. British colonial control of Kenya dates from the Berlin Conference of 1885, when the European powers partitioned East Africa into spheres of influence, with present-day Kenya passing to the British. Beginning in 1895, a railroad was built from Mombasa to Kisumu on Lake Victoria in order to facilitate trade with the interior and with Uganda. The British government established the East African Protectorate and in 1920 made Kenya a British crown colony.
Photo by Wajahat Mahmood
The British opened the fertile highlands to white settlers, who established themselves as large-scale farmers. Extensive tracts of the best land were taken from Africans and reserved for white settlers, who eventually gained control of the colonial government. The white settler-dominated government denied the dispossessed Africans political participation, restricted their cultivation of cash crops such as coffee, permitted forced labor, and maintained a “white highlands” policy that restricted the Kikuyu, one of the largest tribes, to overcrowded reserves. Other tribes and nonwhites
such as East Indians also faced restrictions.
Photo by Wajahat Mahmood
GEOGRAPHY
Kenya lies astride the equator in Eastern Africa between Somalia and Tanzania and bordering the Indian Ocean. The total area of 582,650 square kilometers (somewhat larger than France) includes 13,400 square kilometers of water, mainly Lake Turkana (also known as Lake Rudolf) and Kenya’s portion of Lake Victoria. Kenya’s land boundaries total 3,477 kilometers. The country is bounded by Ethiopia (861 kilometers), Somalia (682 kilometers), Sudan (232 kilometers), Tanzania (769 kilometers), and Uganda (933 kilometers). Kenya has 536 kilometers of coastline on the Indian Ocean.
Photo by kunjan detroja
Topography & Climate
Kenya rises from a low coastal plain on the Indian Ocean in a series of plateaus to more than 3,000 meters in the center of the country. An inland region of semi-arid, bush-covered plains constitutes most of the country’s land area. In the northwest, high-lying scrublands straddle Lake Turkana (Lake Rudolf) and the Kulal Mountains. In the southwest lie the fertile grasslands and forests of the Kenya Highlands, one of the most successful agricultural production regions in Africa. North of Nairobi, the Kenya Highlands is bisected by the Great Rift Valley, an irregular depression that cuts through western Kenya from north to south in two branches. The Rift Valley is the location of the country’s highest mountains, including, in the eastern section, the snow-capped Mt. Kenya (5,199 meters), the country’s highest point and Africa’s second highest. In the south, mountain plains descend westward to the shores Lake Victoria.
Photo by ninara
Kenya’s principal rivers are the 710-kilometer-long Tana, and the Athi, both flowing southeast to the Indian Ocean. Other rivers include the Ewaso Ngiro, flowing northeast to the swamps of the Lorian Plain, and the Nzoia, Yala, and Gori, which drain into Lake Victoria. Kenya’s climate varies from tropical along the coast to arid in the interior, especially in the north and northeast. Intermittent droughts affect most of the country. Less than 15 percent ofthe country receives somewhat reliable rainfall of 760 millimeters or more per year, mainly the southwestern highlands near Lake Victoria and the coastal area, which is tempered by monsoon winds. Most of the country experiences two wet and two dry seasons.
Photo by Rainbirder
Culture
People of African descent make up about 97 percent of the population; they are divided into about 40 ethnic groups belonging to three linguistic families: Bantu, Cushitic, and Nilotic. Bantu-speaking Kenyans comprise three groups: western (Luhya), highlands (including the Kikuyu and the Kamba), and coastal (Mijikenda) Bantu. About three-quarters of Kenyans profess some form of Christianity, although fewer are affiliated with a church. About 40 to 45 percent of Kenyans are Protestant, while 30 percent
are Roman Catholic.
Photo by The Wandering Angel
Economy
Kenya has one of Africa’s worst performing economies, notwithstanding a pick-up of economic growth in the past three years. The economy is market-based, with some state-owned infrastructure enterprises, and maintains a liberalized external trade system. The economy’s
heavy dependence on rain-fed agriculture and the tourism sector leaves it vulnerable to cycles of boom and bust. The agricultural sector employs nearly 75 percent of the country’s 37 million people. Half of the sector’s output remains subsistence production. In 2006 Kenya’s GDP was about US$17.39 billion. Per capita GDP averages somewhat more than US$450 annually. In 2006 the inflation rate for consumer prices was estimated at 14.5 percent. This rate was a significant rise from the previous year’s 10.3 percent, reflecting higher food prices, which carry 50 percent weighting in the consumer price index.
Photo by antonychammond
