COUNTRY OVERVIEW

LOCATION

Tanzania is located in Central East Africa with about 1,400km of coastline along the Indian Ocean.  It is well situated geographically bordering Burundi, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Uganda, Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.  It is the economic hub of East Africa providing natural access and commercial links to eight countries.  Tanzania is the right platform for businesses vying to develop or expand opportunities in the wider region.

LAND AREA

Tanzania is the largest nation in East Africa in terms of land with 883,749km2 (881,289km2 mainland 2,460km2 Zanzibar), plus lakes totalling to 59,100km3.

TOPOGRAPHY

Tanzania has a narrow costal belt with tropical beaches, a plateau covered by savannah and bushes at an elevation of about 1000m, a rift valley, basins, hills, mountains and craters.  It has three major sea ports and about 7% of the land surface is covered by 3 lakes (all of them fresh water).  These are Lake Victoria, Lake Tanganyika and Lake Nyasa.

POPULATION

Tanzania is the largest nation in the East Africa, both in land area and population.  According to the 2002 census, Tanzania mainland has 34.57mn people and Zanzibar has 984,625 people.  The annual population growth rate stands at 2.92 percent for Zanzibar.

LANGUAGES

Swahili and English are the two official languages.

CLIMATE

The climate is tropical along the coast and semi-temperate inland.  Dar es Salaam weather: hottest month, January 23-320C; coldest month,, July 18-290C; driest month, September, 26mm Average rainfall; wettest month, April with 263mm average rainfall.

ETHNICITY

Inhabited by more than 120 tribes, local people are native Africans 99% (of which 95% are Bantu).  The remaining 1% is a composition of Asians, Europeans, Americans and Arabs.

TIME

Three hours ahead of GMT

RELIGION

Christianity, Islam and others.

CURRENCIES

Tanzanian Shilling (TShs).