GHANA

Ghana was once part of the British Empire. It was also one of the first African states to be independent in 1957.

The country has rich natural resources and during the 1960 was very prosperous. After that its economy decline due a number of political problems.

Geography

The south is tropical with plenty of rain and thick forest. Sadly, many of the trees had been cut down for timber and also for agriculture. There is now more grasslands.

In the north the rainfall is less and a hot, dry wind named Harmattan blows down from the distant Sahara Desert.

Most of Ghana's people are farmers and they grow crops to be sold like cocoa, coffee and palm oil. Cocoa is the country's main crop for export. Other exports are banana, tobacco and hardwood timber.

In the north groundnuts (peanuts), cotton and millet are grown. Farmers also rear cattle but they can be effected by the disease-carrying tsetse fly.

Fishermen bring their catch into the small Ghanaian port Elmina where the first European landed in West Africa. A fort at the harbour was built by the Portuguese in about 1490.

The Dutch invaded the country in 1637 and turned the church into a slave market.

In 1956 Ghana built a dam across the river Volta. This created the largest artificial lake in the world. Lake Volta has a size of 8000 sq km. The dam provides electricity for most of Ghana's industry.

LAKE VOLTA

A good network of roads links the capital, Accra with the main ports of Takoradi and Tema. At Tema the mined bauxite is smelted into aluminium. The country also produce gold industrial diamonds and manganese.

ACCRA GHANA'S CAPITOL

History

The name Ghana derives from the empire existed in West Africa between 7th and 12th centuries.
The Europeans arrived during the 1600s named the country Gold Coast because it was gold which tempted them to sail to Ghana.

Later on they turned to trading slave which was more profitable.

The country became a British colony in 1893 and received Independence in 1957. It was the first country in black Africa which broke away from a European Empire.

Ghana was ruled for the following nine years by the controversial Kwame Nkrumah and his supporter called him the Redeemer. He lost his seat to a military coupe in 1966. Since then Ghana's rulers change from military  to civilian.