Côte d'Ivoire
Côte d'Ivoire
A street market in Abidjan. Source: Wikipedia.
Côte d'Ivoire (formerly "Ivory Coast") is a west African nation of over 21 million people with its coast along the Gulf of Guinea in the North Atlantic Ocean, between Ghana and Liberia.
Most of the inhabitants live along the sandy coastal region. Apart from the capital area, the forested interior is sparsely populated.
Côte d'Ivoire's major environmental issues include:
- deforestation (most of the country's forests - once the largest in West Africa - have been heavily logged); and,
- water pollution from sewage and industrial and agricultural effluents.
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Close ties to France since independence in 1960, the development of cocoa production for export, and foreign investment made Cote d'Ivoire one of the most prosperous of the West African states, but did not protect it from political turmoil.
In December 1999, a military coup - the first ever in Cote d'Ivoire's history - overthrew the government. Junta leader Robert Guei blatantly rigged elections held in late 2000 and declared himself the winner. Popular protest forced him to step aside and brought Laurent Gbagbo into power. Ivorian dissidents and disaffected members of the military launched a failed coup attempt in September 2002. Rebel forces claimed the northern half of the country, and in January 2003 were granted ministerial positions in a unity government under the auspices of the Linas-Marcoussis Peace Accord. President Gbagbo and rebel forces resumed implementation of the peace accord in December 2003 after a three-month stalemate, but issues that sparked the civil war, such as land reform and grounds for citizenship, remained unresolved.
In March 2007 President Gbagbo and former New Force rebel leader Guillaume Soro signed the Ouagadougou Political Agreement. As a result of the agreement, Soro joined Gbagbo's government as Prime Minister and the two agreed to reunite the country by dismantling the zone of confidence separating North from South, integrate rebel forces into the national armed forces, and hold elections. Disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration of rebel forces have been problematic as rebels seek to enter the armed forces. Citizen identification and voter registration pose election difficulties, and balloting planned for November 2009 was postponed to 2010.
On 28 November 2010, Alassane Dramane Ouattara won the presidential election, defeating then President Laurent Gbagbo. Gbagbo refused to hand over power, resulting in a 6-month stand-off. In April 2011, after widespread fighting, Gbagbo was formally forced from office by Ouattara supporters with the support of UN and French forces. Several thousand UN troops and several hundred French remain in Cote d'Ivoire to support the transition process.
Geography
Location: Western Africa, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Ghana and Liberia
Geographic Coordinates: 8 00 N, 5 00 W
Area: 322,460 km2 (318,000 km2 land and 4,460 km2 water)
arable land: 10.23%
permanent crops: 11.16%
other: 78.61% (2005)
Land Boundaries: 3,110 km. Border countries: Burkina Faso 584 km, Ghana 668 km, Guinea 610 km, Liberia 716 km, Mali 532 km
Coastline: 515 km
Maritime Claims:
territorial sea: 12 nm
exclusive economic zone: 200 nm
continental shelf: 200 nm
Natural Hazards: coast has heavy surf and no natural harbors; during the rainy season torrential flooding is possible
Terrain: Mostly flat to undulating plains; mountains in northwest. Its lowest point is the Gulf of Guinea (0 metres) and its highest point is Mont Nimba (1,752 metres)
Climate: Tropical along coast, semiarid in far north; three seasons - warm and dry (November to March), hot and dry (March to May), hot and wet (June to October)
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Source: The Map Library |
Source: Wikimedia Commons |
Ecology and Biodiversity
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1. Guinean mangroves 3. Western Guinean lowland forests 5. Guinean forest-savanna mosaic See also: |
Ecoregions of Côte d'Ivoire. Source: World Wildlife Fund |
National Parks:
- Assagny National Park
- Banco National Park
- Comoé National Park
- Îles Ehotilés National Park
- Marahoué National Park
- Mont Nimba National Park
- Mont Péko National Park
- Mont Sângbé National Park
- Taï National Park
Government
Government Type: republic; multiparty presidential regime established 1960; note: the government is currently operating under a power-sharing agreement mandated by international mediators
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Capital: Yamoussoukro (population: 808,000 est. 2009) Other Major City: Abidjan (seat of government) (population 4.009 million est. 2009) Administrative Divisions: 19 regions;
Independence Date: 7 August 1960 (from France) |
Source: Wikimedia Commons |
Legal System: based on French civil law system and customary law. There is judicial review in the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court. Côte d'Ivoire accepts compulsory International Court of Justice (ICJ) jurisdiction, with reservations. It accepts International Criminal (ICCt) jurisdiction under Article 12(3)of the Rome Statute.
Suffrage: 18 years of age; universal
International Environmental Agreements
Côte d'Ivoire is party to international agreements on: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Tropical Timber 83, Tropical Timber 94, Wetlands, and Whaling.
People and Society
Population: 21,504,162 (July 2011 est.)
Ethnic groups: Akan 42.1%, Voltaiques or Gur 17.6%, Northern Mandes 16.5%, Krous 11%, Southern Mandes 10%, other 2.8% (includes 130,000 Lebanese and 14,000 French) (1998)
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Drought settled over West Africa’s Ivory Coast region when wet season rains came late in 2007. Instead of beginning in February, the rainy season didn’t start until March, and steady rains didn’t start until late March, said the Famine Early Warning System Network. Though the rain had started to alleviate the drought, vegetation was still depressed in parts of Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) between March 22 and April 6, 2007, when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite captured the data used to make this image. The image shows current vegetation conditions compared to average conditions recorded since 2000. Areas where plants are growing more slowly or more sparsely than average are brown, while areas where vegetation is denser than average are green. The brown tint that dominates the image indicates that plants through most of the country are more sparse than normal. Among the crops affected by the lack of rain was West Africa’s cocoa crop. About 70 percent of the world’s cocoa comes from West Africa, and Côte d’Ivoire is a top grower, said Reuters. Cocoa prices climbed as the crop fell short. Farmers called the drought the worst in living memory, Reuters said. The delay in rainfall also led to water shortages in parts of Côte d’Ivoire, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. Source: NASA. NASA image created by Jesse Allen, Earth Observatory, using data provided by Inbal Reshef as part of the Global Agricultural Monitoring Project between NASA, the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), and the University of Maryland. |
Age Structure:
0-14 years: 39.8% (male 4,312,133/female 4,240,500)
15-64 years: 57.2% (male 6,262,802/female 6,039,458)
65 years and over: 3% (male 320,396/female 328,873) (2011 est.)
Population Growth Rate: 2.078% (2011 est.)
Birthrate: 30.95 births/1,000 population (2011 est.)
Death Rate: 10.16 deaths/1,000 population (July 2011 est.)
Net Migration Rate: 0 migrant(s)/1,000 population NA (2011 est.)
Life Expectancy at Birth: 56.78 years
Total Fertility Rate: 3.92 children born/woman (2011 est.)
Languages: French (official), 60 native dialects with Dioula the most widely spoken
Literacy (age 15 and over can read and write) 48.7% (male: 60.8% - female: 38.6% [2000 est.])
Urbanization: 51% of total population (2010) growing at an annual rate of change of 3.7% (2010-15 est.)
Water
Total Renewable Water Resources: 81 cu km (2001)
Freshwater Withdrawal: Total: 0.93 cu km/yr (24% domestic, 12% industrial, 65% agriculture). Per capita: 51 cu m/yr (2000)
Access to improve drinking water sources: 80% of population (2008)
Access to improved sanitation facilities: 23% of population (2008)
Agriculture
Agricultural Products: coffee, cocoa beans, bananas, palm kernels, corn, rice, manioc (tapioca), sweet potatoes, sugar, cotton, rubber; timber
Irrigated Lands: 730 sq km (2003)
Resources
Natural Resources: petroleum, natural gas, diamonds, manganese, iron ore, cobalt, bauxite, copper, gold, nickel, tantalum, silica sand, clay, cocoa beans, coffee, palm oil, hydropower
Energy
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Production | Consumption | Exports | Imports | Reserves |
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Electricity |
5.548 billion kWh (2008 est.) |
3.584 billion kWh (2008 est.) |
599 million kWh (2008 est.) |
599 million kWh (2008 est.) |
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Oil |
44,880 bbl/day (2010 est.) |
25,000 bbl/day (2010 est.) |
70,800 bbl/day (2009 est.) |
85,190 bbl/day (2009 est.) |
100 million bbl (1 January 2011 est.) |
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Natural Gas |
1.6 billion cu m (2009 est.) |
1.6 billion cu m (2009 est.) |
0 cu m (2009 est.) |
0 cu m (2009) |
28.32 billion cu m (1 January 2011 est.) |
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Source: CIA Factbook |
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Conflict
International Dispute: Despite the presence of over 9,000 UN forces (UNOCI) in Cote d'Ivoire since 2004, ethnic conflict still leaves displaced hundreds of thousands of Ivorians in and out of the country as well as driven out migrants from neighboring states who worked in Ivorian cocoa plantations.
The March 2007 peace deal between Ivorian rebels and the government brought significant numbers of rebels out of hiding in neighboring states
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| Abidjan. Source: Wikimedia Commons. |
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A fishermen throws his net into the Bandama River to catch fish, which he will sell the next day. The river flows from Lake Kossou to the Gulf of Guinea. Source: Lori Duff/U.S. Peace Corps |
Economy
Cote d'Ivoire is heavily dependent on agriculture and related activities, which engage roughly 68% of the population.
Cote d'Ivoire is the world's largest producer and exporter of cocoa beans and a significant producer and exporter of coffee and palm oil. Consequently, the economy is highly sensitive to fluctuations in international prices for these products, and, to a lesser extent, in climatic conditions. Cocoa, oil, and coffee are the country's top export revenue earners, but the country is also producing gold.
Since the end of the civil war in 2003, political turmoil has continued to damage the economy, resulting in the loss of foreign investment and slow economic growth. GDP grew by more than 2% in 2008 and around 4% per year in 2009-10. Per capita income has declined by 15% since 1999, but registered a slight improvement in 2009-10.
Power cuts caused by a turbine failure in early 2010 slowed economic activity.
Cote d'Ivoire in 2010 signed agreements to restructure its Paris Club bilateral, other bilateral, and London Club debt.
Cote d'Ivoire's long term challenges include political instability and degrading infrastructure.
In late 2011, Cote D'Ivoire's economy was recovering from a severe downturn of the first quarter of the year that was caused by widespread post-election fighting.
GDP (Purchasing Power Parity): $35.6 billion (2011 est.)
GDP (Official Exchange Rate): $23.8 billion (2011 est.)
GDP-per capita (PPP): $1,600 (2011 est.)
GDP-composition by sector:
agriculture: 29.2%
industry: 20.9%
services: 49.8% (2011 est.)
Population Below Poverty Line: 42% (2006 est.)
Industries: foodstuffs, beverages; wood products, oil refining, truck and bus assembly, textiles, fertilizer, building materials, electricity, ship construction and repair
Exports: cocoa, coffee, timber, petroleum, cotton, bananas, pineapples, palm oil, fish
Imports: fuel, capital equipment, foodstuffs
Currency: Communaute Financiere Africaine franc (XOF)
Ports and Terminals: Abidjan, Espoir, San-Pedro
Citation
Central Intelligence Agency (Lead Author);CIA World Factbook (Content Source);Peter Saundry, Lakhdar Boukerrou (Topic Editor) "Côte d'Ivoire". In: Encyclopedia of Earth. Eds. Cutler J. Cleveland (Washington, D.C.: Environmental Information Coalition, National Council for Science and the Environment). [First published in the Encyclopedia of Earth May 30, 2009; Last revised Date February 7, 2012; Retrieved February 9, 2012 <http://www.eoearth.org/article/C%C3%B4te_d%27Ivoire>
The Author
The Central Intelligence Agency was created in 1947 with the signing of the National Security Act by President Harry S. Truman. The act also created a Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) to serve as head of the United States intelligence community; act as the principal adviser to the President for intelligence matters related to the national security; and serve as head of the Central Intelligence Agency. The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 amended the National Securit ... (Full Bio)
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