Mova0.5 pre-release⌕
☰
home / corpora / wikipedia / en / Cape Verde

Cape Verde · page 2

From Wikipedia, «Cape Verde», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. The trees and pragmatics of these pages, Mova's parse of that text, are CC BY-SA 4.0 too.

1 2 3 4

Cape Verde is a founding member state of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries, also known as the Lusophone Commonwealth, an international organization and political association of Lusophone nations across four continents, where Portuguese is an official language.78 Cape Verde has bilateral relations with some Lusophone nations and holds membership in a number of international organizations.[22]79 It also participates in most international conferences on economic and political issues.[22]80 Since 2007, Cape Verde has a special partnership status[39] with the EU, under the Cotonou Agreement, and might apply for special membership, in particular because the Cape Verdean escudo, the country's currency, is indexed to the euro.[40]81 In 2011 Cape Verde ratified the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.[41]82 In 2017 Cape Verde signed the UN treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.[42]83

In November 2021, Cape Verde opened its first embassy in Nigeria.[43]84

Military

Main article: Cape Verdean Armed Forces

The military of Cape Verde consists of the National Guard and the Coast Guard; 0.7% of the country's GDP was spent on the military in 2005.85 Having fought their only battles in the war for independence against Portugal between 1974 and 1975, the efforts of the Cape Verdean armed forces have turned to combatting international drug trafficking.86 In 2007, together with the Cape Verdean Police, they carried out Operation Flying Launch (Operacão Lancha Voadora), a successful operation to put an end to a drug trafficking group which smuggled cocaine from Colombia to the Netherlands and Germany using the country as a reorder point.87 The operation took more than three years, being a secret operation during the first two years, and ended in 2010.88 In 2016, Cape Verdean Armed Forces were involved in the Monte Tchota massacre, a green-on-green incident that resulted in 11 deaths.[44]89

Geography

Main article: Geography of Cape Verde

The Cape Verde archipelago is in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 570 km off the western coast of the African continent, near Senegal corpus, The Gambia corpus, and Mauritania corpus as well as part of the Macaronesia ecoregion.90 It lies between latitudes 14° and 18°N, and longitudes 22° and 26°W. The country is a horseshoe-shaped cluster of ten islands (nine inhabited) and eight islets,[45] that constitute an area of 4033 km2 (1557 sq mi).[45]91

The islands are spatially divided into two groups:92

The largest island, both in size and population, is Santiago, which hosts the nation's capital, Praia, the principal urban agglomeration in the archipelago.[45]95 Sal, Boa Vista, and Maio, are fairly flat, sandy, and dry; the other islands are generally rockier with more vegetation.96

Physical geography and geology

Main article: Geology of Cape Verde

Geologically, the islands are principally composed of igneous rocks, with volcanic structures and pyroclastic debris comprising the majority of the archipelago's total volume.97 The volcanic and plutonic rocks are distinctly basic; the archipelago is a soda-alkaline petrographic province, with a petrologic succession similar to that found in other Macaronesian islands.98 The islands lie on a bathymetric swell known as the Cape Verde Rise.[46]99 The rise is one of the largest protuberances in the world's oceans, rising 2.2 km in a semi-circular region of 1200 km2 (460 sq mi), associated with a rise of the geoid.[47]100

Magnetic anomalies identified in the vicinity of the archipelago indicate that the structures forming the islands date back 125–150 million years: the islands date from 8 million (in the west) to 20 million years (in the east).[47]101 The oldest exposed rocks occurred on Maio and the northern peninsula of Santiago and are 128–131 million-year-old pillow lavas.102 The first stage of volcanism in the islands began in the early Miocene and reached its peak at the end of this period when the islands reached their maximum sizes.103

Historical volcanism (within human settlement) has been restricted to Fogo.[48]104 Pico do Fogo, the largest active volcano in the region, erupted in 2014.105 It has an 8 km caldera, the rim of which is at an elevation of 1,600 m and an interior cone that rises to 2,829 m above sea level.106 The caldera resulted from subsidence, following the partial evacuation (eruption) of the magma chamber, along a cylindrical column from within the magma chamber (at a depth of 8 km).107

Extensive salt flats are found on Sal and Maio.[45]108 On Santiago, Santo Antão, and São Nicolau, arid slopes give way in places to sugarcane fields or banana plantations spread along the base of towering mountains.[45]109 Ocean cliffs have been formed by catastrophic debris landslides.[49]110

Climate

Further information: Geography of Cape Verde § Climate

Cape Verde's climate is milder than that of the African mainland because the surrounding sea moderates temperatures, and cold Atlantic currents produce an arid atmosphere.111 Conversely, the islands do not receive the upwelling (cold streams) that affect the West African coast, so the air temperature is cooler than in Senegal, but the sea is warmer.112 Because of the relief of some islands, such as Santiago with its steep mountains, the islands can have orographically induced precipitation, allowing rich woods and luxuriant vegetation to grow where the humid air condenses, soaking the plants, rocks, soil, logs, moss, etc. On the higher islands and somewhat wetter islands, the climate is suitable for the development of dry monsoon forests and laurel forests.[45]113 Cape Verde lies in the Cape Verde Islands dry forests ecoregion.[50]114 Average temperatures range from 22 C in February to 27 C in September.[51]115 Cape Verde is part of the Sahelian semi-arid belt, with nothing like the rainfall levels of nearby West Africa.[45]116 It rains irregularly between August and October, with frequent brief heavy downpours.[45]117 A desert is usually defined as terrain that receives less than 250 mm of annual rainfall.118 Sal's total of 145 mm confirms this classification.119 Most of the year's rain falls in September.[51]120

Because of the infrequent occurrence of rainfall where not mountainous, the landscape is so arid that less than two percent of it is arable.[52]121 The archipelago can be divided into four broad ecological zones – arid, semiarid, sub-humid and humid, according to altitude and average annual rainfall ranging from less than 100 mm in the arid areas of the coast as in the Deserto de Viana (67 mm in Sal Rei) to more than 1,000 mm in the humid mountain.122 Most rainfall precipitation is due to condensation of the ocean mist.123 In some islands, like Santiago, the wetter climate of the interior and the eastern coast contrasts with the drier one on the south/southwest coast.124

Western Hemisphere-bound hurricanes often have their early beginnings near the Cape Verde Islands.125 These Cape Verde hurricanes can become very intense as they cross warm Atlantic waters.126 The average hurricane season has about two Cape Verde-type hurricanes, which are usually the largest and most intense storms of the season because they often have plenty of warm open ocean over which to develop before encountering land.127 The five largest Atlantic tropical cyclones on record have been Cape Verde-type hurricanes.128 Most of the longest-lived tropical cyclones in the Atlantic basin are Cape Verde hurricanes.[53]129

Since 1851 the islands have been twice struck by hurricanes: in 1892 and in 2015 (Hurricane Fred, the easternmost hurricane ever to form in the Atlantic).[54]130

According to the president of Nauru corpus, in 2011, Cape Verde was ranked the eighth most endangered nation due to flooding from climate change.[55]131 In 2023, UN Secretary-General António Guterres arrived in Cabo Verde to raise concerns about climate change.132 He said that the country is on the frontlines of the existential crisis generated by climate disruptions and that world leaders need to take action to address the climate crisis.[56]133 Cabo Verde is a leader in renewable energy in sub-Saharan Africa.134 As of 2023, 20% of its energy comes from renewable sources, and the goal is to increase that to 50% by 2030.[57]135 In 2023, Portugal signed an agreement to forgive €140 million of Cape Verde's debt in exchange for the country investing in environmental projects.136 This agreement is one of the first debt-for-nature swaps in Africa.[58]137

Biodiversity

Main article: Wildlife of Cape Verde, Flora of Cape Verde, Cape Verde Islands dry forests

Cape Verde's isolation has resulted in the islands having several endemic species, particularly birds and reptiles, many of which are endangered by human development.138 Endemic birds include Alexander's swift (Apus alexandri), Bourne's heron (Ardea purpurea bournei), the Raso lark (Alauda razae), the Cape Verde warbler (Acrocephalus brevipennis), and the Iago sparrow (Passer iagoensis).[59]139 The islands are also an important breeding area for seabirds including the Cape Verde shearwater.140 Reptiles include the Cape Verde giant gecko (Tarentola gigas).141

Forest cover is around 11% of the total land area, equivalent to 45,720 hectares (ha) of forest in 2020, up from 15,380 ha in 1990.142 In 2020, naturally regenerating forest covered 13,680 ha and planted forest covered 32,040 ha.143 For the year 2015, 100% of the forest area was reported to be under public ownership.[60][61]144

Administrative divisions

Main article: Administrative divisions of Cape Verde

Cape Verde is divided into 22 municipalities (concelhos) and subdivided into 32 parishes (freguesias), based on the religious parishes that existed during the colonial period:145

Barlavento Islands146

Sotavento Islands163

Economy

Main article: Economy of Cape Verde

Cape Verde's notable economic growth and improvement in living conditions despite a lack of natural resources have garnered international recognition, with other countries and international organisations often providing development aid.183 Since 2007, the UN has classified it as a developing nation rather than a least developed country.184

Cape Verde has few natural resources.185 Only five of the ten main islands (Santiago, Santo Antão, São Nicolau, Fogo, and Brava) normally support significant agricultural production,[64] and over 90% of all food consumed is imported.186 Mineral resources include salt, pozzolana (a volcanic rock used in cement production), and limestone.[22]187 Its small number of wineries making Portuguese-style wines have traditionally focused on the domestic market, but have recently met with some international acclaim.188

The economy is service-oriented, with commerce, transport, and public services accounting for more than 70% of the GDP.189 Although nearly 35% of the population lives in rural areas, agriculture and fishing contribute only about 9% of GDP.190 Light manufacturing accounts for most of the remainder.191 Fish and shellfish are plentiful, and small quantities are exported.192 Cape Verde has cold storage and freezing facilities and fish processing plants in Mindelo, Praia, and on Sal.193 Expatriate Cape Verdeans contribute an amount estimated at 20% of GDP to the domestic economy through remittances.[22]194 Despite having few natural resources and being semi-desert, the country has the highest living standards in the region and has attracted thousands of immigrants of different nationalities.195

1 2 3 4

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/wikipedia/en/Cape_Verde/page/2/