Africa’s Poverty Amid Vast Richness

SOME SAY OUR planet has six continents, others claim the number is eight, but generally it is agreed that the world has seven. A continent is a large land mass.

In alphabetical order the world’s continents are Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America.

Those who say the world has six justify this by pointing out that the two Americas are joined and resultantly should really be counted as one continent.

In contemporary times the existence of a continental land mass covered by the Pacific Ocean was discovered by scientists and named Zealandia.

Some say this is the world’s eighth continent.

Antarctica excluded, here are some interesting facts on the world’s six other continents:

Measured by gross domestic product (GDP) Asia is the wealthiest in terms of global economic output.

By GDP ranking, North America holds the second position, followed in descending order by Europe, South America, Africa, and Australia.

With a population far bigger than Australia when measured by per-capita GDP, Africa is considered the poorest of all.

Determined as a percentage of the world’s land mass, Africa is the second-largest continent.

It is much smaller than Asia, which covers over a third of the world’s inhabited land mass.

Covering just short of a quarter of the world’s entire land mass, Africa is considerably bigger than the others.

Africa is the continent with the most independent nations.

Namibia is one of Africa’s 54 countries.

Add to this number the continent’s six island nations.

The world’s population is rapidly growing, and by the end of this decade will exceed eight billion people.

With close to 62% of the world’s population squeezed into Asia, here again Africa holds the second place.

But the gap between first and second is huge, with only 16% of the global population living on this continent – few people with lots of arable land, rivers, lakes, and other resources.

Africa is considered the world’s poorest continent as its contribution to the global economy amounts to a mere 3%.

But Africa is not poor.

Potentially a rich continent, why then does Africa have so many poor people?

The same can be asked about Namibia. There are many poor people, yet the country has so much to offer.

Some say it’s due to history and the country’s legacy of colonialism. Others attribute Africa’s widespread poverty to exploitation.

It is an anatomical reality that when one points a finger you have three pointing back. If not discovered yet, you will soon learn that this is one of life’s truths too – a powerful statement that some will consider rather presumptuous.

But facts speak volumes of a continent blessed with an abundance of riches below and above the ground.

Seemingly others can see what Africa’s people cannot see.

Just shift the focus from resource extraction to value addition.

The continent has the freshest brainpower too with the world’s youngest and fastest-urbanising population.

Time to stop blame-gaming and start doing the right things right now.

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