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Mauritania Geography 2014

SOURCE: 2014 CIA WORLD FACTBOOK AND OTHER SOURCES











Mauritania Geography 2014
SOURCE: 2014 CIA WORLD FACTBOOK AND OTHER SOURCES


Page last updated on January 28, 2014

Location:
Western Africa, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Senegal and Western Sahara

Geographic coordinates:
20 00 N, 12 00 W

Map references:
Africa

Area:
total: 1,030,700 sq km
[see also: Area - total country ranks ]
country comparison to the world: 29
land: 1,030,700 sq km
water: 0 sq km

Area - comparative:
slightly larger than three times the size of New Mexico

Land boundaries:
total: 5,074 km
border countries: Algeria 463 km, Mali 2,237 km, Senegal 813 km, Western Sahara 1,561 km
[see also: Land boundaries country ranks ]

Coastline:
754 km
[see also: Coastline country ranks ]

Maritime claims:
territorial sea: 12 nm
contiguous zone: 24 nm
exclusive economic zone: 200 nm
continental shelf: 200 nm or to the edge of the continental margin

Climate:
desert; constantly hot, dry, dusty
More Climate Details

Terrain:
mostly barren, flat plains of the Sahara; some central hills

Elevation extremes:
lowest point: Sebkhet Te-n-Dghamcha -5 m
[see also: Elevation extremes - lowest point country ranks ]
highest point: Kediet Ijill 915 m

Natural resources:
iron ore, gypsum, copper, phosphate, diamonds, gold, oil, fish

Land use:
arable land: 0.44%
[see also: Land use - arable land country ranks ]
permanent crops: 0.01%
other: 99.55% (2011)

Irrigated land:
450.1 sq km (2004)
[see also: Irrigated land country ranks ]

Total renewable water resources:
11.4 cu km (2011)
[see also: Total renewable water resources country ranks ]

Freshwater withdrawal (domestic/industrial/agricultural):
total: 1.35 cu km/yr (7%/2%/91%)
[see also: Freshwater withdrawal (domestic/industrial/agricultural) - total country ranks ]
per capita: 420.2 cu m/yr (2005)

Natural hazards:
hot, dry, dust/sand-laden sirocco wind blows primarily in March and April; periodic droughts

Environment - current issues:
overgrazing, deforestation, and soil erosion aggravated by drought are contributing to desertification; limited natural freshwater resources away from the Senegal, which is the only perennial river; locust infestation

Environment - international agreements:
party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands, Whaling
signed, but not ratified: none of the selected agreements

Geography - note:
most of the population is concentrated in the cities of Nouakchott and Nouadhibou and along the Senegal River in the southern part of the country


NOTE: 1) The information regarding Mauritania on this page is re-published from the 2014 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Mauritania Geography 2014 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Mauritania Geography 2014 should be addressed to the CIA.
2) The rank that you see is the CIA reported rank, which may habe the following issues:
  a) They assign increasing rank number, alphabetically for countries with the same value of the ranked item, whereas we assign them the same rank.
  b) The CIA sometimes assignes counterintuitive ranks. For example, it assigns unemployment rates in increasing order, whereas we rank them in decreasing order






This page was last modified 06-Nov-14
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