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Inner Niger Delta
The Inner Niger Delta, also known as the Macina or Masina, is the inland delta of the Niger River. It is an area of fluvial wetlands, lakes and floodplains in the semi-arid Sahel area of central Mali, just south of the Sahara desert. Location and description The delta consists of the middle course of the Niger River, between the bifurcated Niger and its tributary the Bani, which from here run north towards the desert. The Niger is the longest river in West Africa. Towns such as the river-port of Mopti, Sévaré and Djenné, with its mud-brick Great Mosque lie in the 400 km-long region. The Fulani and Dogon inhabit the Macina region and the surrounding area, which has a population of over 500,000. Most of the year the area has a hot and dry climate, with hot winds from the nearby Sahara raising the temperature up to 40°C. During the wet season, which lasts from June to September but lasts longer the further south one goes, the swamp floods into a lake and naturally irrig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sahel
The Sahel (; ar, ساحل ' , "coast, shore") is a region in North Africa. It is defined as the ecoclimatic and biogeographic realm of transition between the Sahara to the north and the Sudanian savanna to the south. Having a hot semi-arid climate, it stretches across the south-central latitudes of Northern Africa between the Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea. The Sahel part of Africa includes – from west to east – parts of northern Senegal, southern Mauritania, central Mali, northern Burkina Faso, the extreme south of Algeria, Niger, the extreme north of Nigeria, Cameroon and Central African Republic, central Chad, central and southern Sudan, the extreme north of South Sudan, Eritrea and Ethiopia. Historically, the western part of the Sahel was sometimes known as the Sudan region (''bilād as-sūdān'' "lands of the Sudan"). This belt was located between the Sahara and the coastal areas of West Africa. There are frequent shortages of food and water due to the dry h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rice
Rice is the seed of the grass species ''Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice) or less commonly ''Oryza glaberrima ''Oryza glaberrima'', commonly known as African rice, is one of the two domesticated rice species. It was first domesticated and grown in West Africa around 3,000 years ago. In agriculture, it has largely been replaced by higher-yielding Asian r ...'' (African rice). The name wild rice is usually used for species of the genera ''Zizania (genus), Zizania'' and ''Porteresia'', both wild and domesticated, although the term may also be used for primitive or uncultivated varieties of ''Oryza''. As a cereal, cereal grain, domesticated rice is the most widely consumed staple food for over half of the world's World population, human population,Abstract, "Rice feeds more than half the world's population." especially in Asia and Africa. It is the agricultural commodity with the third-highest worldwide production, after sugarcane and maize. Since sizable portions of sugarcane and ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wet Season
The wet season (sometimes called the Rainy season) is the time of year when most of a region's average annual rainfall occurs. It is the time of year where the majority of a country's or region's annual precipitation occurs. Generally, the season lasts at least a month. The term ''green season'' is also sometimes used as a euphemism by tourist authorities. Areas with wet seasons are dispersed across portions of the tropics and subtropics. Under the Köppen climate classification, for tropical climates, a wet season month is defined as a month where average precipitation is or more. In contrast to areas with savanna climates and monsoon regimes, Mediterranean climates have wet winters and dry summers. Dry and rainy months are characteristic of tropical seasonal forests: in contrast to tropical rainforests, which do not have dry or wet seasons, since their rainfall is equally distributed throughout the year.Elisabeth M. Benders-Hyde (2003)World Climates.Blue Planet Biomes. Retr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Intertropical Convergence Zone
The Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ ), known by sailors as the doldrums or the calms because of its monotonous windless weather, is the area where the northeast and the southeast trade winds converge. It encircles Earth near the thermal equator though its specific position varies seasonally. When it lies near the geographic Equator, it is called the near-equatorial trough. Where the ITCZ is drawn into and merges with a monsoonal circulation, it is sometimes referred to as a monsoon trough, a usage that is more common in Australia and parts of Asia. Meteorology The ITCZ was originally identified from the 1920s to the 1940s as the ''Intertropical Front'' (''ITF''), but after the recognition in the 1940s and the 1950s of the significance of wind field convergence in tropical weather production, the term ''Intertropical Convergence Zone'' (''ITCZ'') was then applied. The ITCZ appears as a band of clouds, usually thunderstorms, that encircle the globe near the Equator. In the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Precipitation (meteorology)
In meteorology, precipitation is any product of the condensation of atmospheric water vapor that falls under gravitational pull from clouds. The main forms of precipitation include drizzle, rain, sleet, snow, ice pellets, graupel and hail. Precipitation occurs when a portion of the atmosphere becomes saturated with water vapor (reaching 100% relative humidity), so that the water condenses and "precipitates" or falls. Thus, fog and mist are not precipitation but colloids, because the water vapor does not condense sufficiently to precipitate. Two processes, possibly acting together, can lead to air becoming saturated: cooling the air or adding water vapor to the air. Precipitation forms as smaller droplets coalesce via collision with other rain drops or ice crystals within a cloud. Short, intense periods of rain in scattered locations are called showers. Moisture that is lifted or otherwise forced to rise over a layer of sub-freezing air at the surface may be condense ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ecosystem
An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the system through photosynthesis and is incorporated into plant tissue. By feeding on plants and on one another, animals play an important role in the movement of matter and energy through the system. They also influence the quantity of plant and microbial biomass present. By breaking down dead organic matter, decomposers release carbon back to the atmosphere and facilitate nutrient cycling by converting nutrients stored in dead biomass back to a form that can be readily used by plants and microbes. Ecosystems are controlled by external and internal factors. External factors such as climate, parent material which forms the soil and topography, control the overall structure of an ecosystem but are not themselves influenced by the ecosystem. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vegetation Change Wet-Dry Season Niger Inland Delta
Vegetation is an assemblage of plant species and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic characteristics. It is broader than the term ''flora'' which refers to species composition. Perhaps the closest synonym is plant community, but ''vegetation'' can, and often does, refer to a wider range of spatial scales than that term does, including scales as large as the global. Primeval redwood forests, coastal mangrove stands, sphagnum bogs, desert soil crusts, roadside weed patches, wheat fields, cultivated gardens and lawns; all are encompassed by the term ''vegetation''. The vegetation type is defined by characteristic dominant species, or a common aspect of the assemblage, such as an elevation range or environmental commonality. The contemporary use of ''vegetation'' approximates that of ecologist Frederic Clements' term earth cover, an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its Metropolitan France, metropolitan area extends from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean and from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea; overseas territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the North Atlantic, the French West Indies, and many islands in Oceania and the Indian Ocean. Due to its several coastal territories, France has the largest exclusive economic zone in the world. France borders Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Monaco, Italy, Andorra, and Spain in continental Europe, as well as the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Netherlands, Suriname, and Brazil in the Americas via its overseas territories in French Guiana and Saint Martin (island), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toucouleur Empire
The Tidjaniya Caliphate ( ar, الخلافة التجانية; also known as the Tijaniyya Jihad state or the Segu Tukulor or the Toucouleur Empire) (1861–1890) was founded in the mid-nineteenth century by Elhadj Oumar Foutiyou Tall of the Toucouleur people of Senegal. History Omar Tall returned from the Hajj in 1836 with the titles of El Hadj and caliph of the Tijaniyya brotherhood of the Sudan. After a long stay in Futa Tooro (present day Senegal), he moved to the Fouta Djallon region (in present-day Guinea) in the 1840s. Here, he completed a major work on Tijaniyya scholarship; after this he started to focus on military struggle. Omar Tall planned to conquer new pagan territory for Islam. Omar Tall managed to bring together a large army of Fulbe and Toucouleur followers and he defeated the states of Tamba (1852), Kaarta Kingdom (1855), Bamana Empire (1861), Massina Empire (1862) and Timbuktu (1863). During the decisive victory in the Battle of Segou on March 10, 1861, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Umar Tall
Hadji Oumarûl Foutiyou Tall (Umar ibn Sa'id al-Futi Tal, ar, حاج عمر بن سعيد طعل), ( – 1864 CE), born in Futa Tooro, present day Senegal, was a West African political leader, Islamic scholar, Tijani Sufi and Toucouleur military commander who founded the short-lived Toucouleur Empire encompassing much of what is now Senegal, Guinea, Mauritania and Mali. Lapidus, Ira M. (2014) A History of Islamic Societies. 3rd edition, New York: Cambridge University Press, pages 472-473. Name Omar Tall's name is spelled variously: in particular, his first name is commonly transliterated in French as ''Omar'', although some sources prefer ''Umar''; the patronymic, ''ibn Sa'id'', is often omitted; and the final element of his name, ''Tall'' ( ar, طعل, links=no), is spelt variously as ''Tall'', ''Taal'' or ''Tal''. The honorific ''El Hadj'' (also ''al-Hajj'' or ''el-Hadj''), reserved for a Muslim who has successfully made the Hajj to Mecca, precedes Omar Tall's name in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hamdullahi
Hamdullahi ( ar, حمد الله; also ''Hamdallahi'' or ''Hamdallaye''. From the Arabic: ''Praise to God'') is a town in the Mopti Region of Mali. In the 19th century, it was the capital of the in what is now the Fula empire of Massina. Founded around 1820 by Seku Amadu. On March 16, 1862, the town fell to the Toucouleur conqueror El Hadj Umar Tall after three major battles that claimed over 70,000 lives. Umar Tall destroyed the city, marking the effective end of the Massina Empire. The ruins of the abandoned town are located 21 km southeast of Mopti, at a site lying to the east of the Bani River and to the west of the Bandiagara plateau. The link is to a pdf containing the whole issue. Need to scroll down to page 24 for article. The town was encircled by sun-dried mudbrick A mudbrick or mud-brick is an air-dried brick, made of a mixture of loam, mud, sand and water mixed with a binding material such as rice husks or straw. Mudbricks are known from 9000 BCE, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Massina Empire
The Caliphate of Hamdullahi ( ar, خلافة حمد الله; also: Dina of Massina, Sise Jihad state) commonly known as the Massina empire (also spelled ''Maasina'' or ''Macina'') was an early nineteenth-century Fulbe Jihad state centered in the Inner Niger Delta area of what is now the Mopti and Ségou Regions of Mali. Its capital was at Hamdullahi. History The Fulas of the region had for centuries been the vassals of larger states, including the Mali Empire (13th-14th centuries), the Songhai Empire (15th century), the Moroccan pashas of Tomboctou (16th century), and the Bambara Empire at Ségou (17th century). By the early 1800s, many of these larger states had declined in power and inspired by the recent Muslim uprisings of Usman dan Fodio in nearby Hausaland, preacher and social reformer Seku Amadu began efforts at increasing religious revivals in his homeland. Early struggle created the Massina leadership and in 1818 Seku Amadu led a jihad against the Bambara Empire i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
