African Great Lakes

The Great Lakes and the East African coastline as seen from space. The Indian Ocean can be seen to the right.

The Great Lakes of Africa are a series of lakes in and around the Great Rift Valley. They include Lake Victoria, the second largest fresh water lake in the world in terms of surface area, and Lake Tanganyika, the world's second largest in volume as well as the second deepest.

The term "Great Lakes" is in the African context a rather loose one. Unlike their American counterparts, the three largest lakes have a host of nearby middle-sized and small lakes, though the small ones would be considered very substantial in many countries of the world. There is no accepted size criterion for "Great Lake."

Contrary to early European explorers' assumptions that one lake was the source of the Nile, it is now accepted that glaciers in the Ruwezori Mountains and more than one lake and river feed the Nile's waters. Burundi claims to be the site of the springs that flow into the Kagera River, the largest of the several rivers that feed into Lake Victoria before the water exits the lake at Ripon Falls as the Victoria Nile. But a smaller system of rivers drains the Virungas and Ruwenzori mountains and the land between them and empties into Lake Albert, where the water joins with the Victoria Nile and then flows north as the White Nile.

Geography

The lakes are divided between three different catchments (river basins), and a number have no exit. The following, in order of size from largest down, are included on most lists of the African Great Lakes:

• Lake Victoria
• Lake Tanganyika
• Lake Malawi
• Lake Turkana
• Lake Albert
• Lake Edward
• Lake Kivu

Some call only Lake Victoria, Lake Albert, and Lake Edward the Great Lakes as they are the only three that empty into the White Nile, which feeds into the Nile River. (Lake Kyoga is part of the Great Lakes system but is not itself considered a Great Lake, on size grounds. Lake Tanganyika and Lake Kivu both empty into the Congo River system, while Lake Malawi is drained by the Shire River into the Zambezi. Lake Turkana has no outlet.

Two other lakes close to Lake Tanganyika do not appear on the lists despite being larger than Edward and Kivu: Lake Rukwa and Lake Mweru.

Because the term is a loose one, it is often preferable to use other categorizations such as 'African Rift Valley Lakes' or 'East African Lakes'.

Geology

Until 12 million years ago, the bountiful waters of the equatorial plateau either flowed west into the Congo River system or east to the Indian Ocean. Creation of the Great Rift Valley changed that. The basins that resulted from the geological uplifts filled with water that now flowed north.

Great Lakes region

The term Great Lake region is likewise somewhat loose. It is used in a narrow sense for the area lying between northern Lake Tanganyika, western Lake Victoria, and lakes Kivu, Edward and Albert. This comprises Burundi, Rwanda, northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, and northwestern Kenya and Tanzania. It is used in a wider sense to extend to all of Kenya and Tanzania, but not usually as far south as Zambia, Malawi, and Mozambique nor as far north as Ethiopia, though these four countries border one of the Great Lakes.

An estimated 107 million people live in the Great Lakes region. The area described in the narrow sense above is one of the most densely populated areas of Africa. Because of past volcanic activity this area also contains some of Africa's best farmland. Its altitude gives it a sub-tropical climate despite being right on the equator, becoming temperate in the mountains. This makes tropical diseases of humans and livestock, such as trypanosomiasis, less prevalent, so that, for instance, cattle and other susceptible animals thrive.

Because of the density of population and the agricultural surplus in the region the area became highly organized into a number of small states. The most powerful of these monarchies were Rwanda, Burundi, Buganda, and Bunyoro. Unusually for sub-Saharan Africa, the traditional borders were largely maintained by the colonial powers.

Being the much-sought-after source of the Nile River, the region had long been of interest to Europeans. The first Europeans to arrive in the region in any numbers were missionaries, who had limited success in converting the locals but did open the region to later colonization. The increased contact with the rest of the world led to a series of devastating epidemics affecting both humans and livestock. These decreased the region's population dramatically, by up to 60 percent in some areas. The region did not return to its precolonial population until the 1950s.

While seen as a region with great potential after independence, the region has in recent decades been marred by civil war and conflict, from which only Kenya and Tanzania have largely escaped. The worst affected areas have been left in great poverty.

Sources and further reading

• Jean-Pierre Chrétien. The Great Lakes of Africa: Two Thousand Years of History trans Scott Straus
• Pavitt, Nigel. 2001. Africa's Great Rift Valley. New York: Harry N. Abrams. ISBN 0810906023
• East Africa. 1986. Amsterdam: Time Life Books. ISBN 0809453193
• Holmes, Martha, Gavin Maxwell, and Tim Scoones. 2004. Nile. London: BBC Books. ISBN 0563487135

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