Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered to the north by the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania to the northeast, Malawi to the east, Mozambique to the southeast, Botswana (via a tiny border of Chobe District) and Zimbabwe to the south, Namibia (via the Caprivi Strip) to the southwest, and Angola to the west. The capital city of Zambia is Lusaka, located in the south-central part of Zambia. The population is concentrated mainly around Lusaka in the south and the Copperbelt Province to the north, the core economic hubs of Zambia. Originally inhabited by Khoisan peoples, the region was affected by the Bantu expansion of the thirteenth century. Following European expeditions in the eighteenth century, the British Empire began to consolidate control of the area following the 1890 British Ultimatum against the Portuguese, who had claimed the area between Angola and Mozambique in the 1885 Pink Map. Britain formed the British protectorates of Barotziland–North-Western Rhodesia and North-Eastern Rhodesia towards the end of the nineteenth century. These were merged in 1911 to form Northern Rhodesia. For most of the colonial period, Zambia was governed by an administration appointed from London with the advice of the British South Africa Company. On 24 October 1964, Zambia became independent of the United Kingdom as a republic in the Commonwealth, and prime minister Kenneth Kaunda became the inaugural president. Kaunda's socialist United National Independence Party (UNIP) maintained power from 1964 until 1991, with him playing a role in regional diplomacy, cooperating with the United States in search of solutions to conflicts in Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Angola, and Namibia. From 1972 to 1991, Zambia was a one-party state with UNIP as the sole legal political party under the motto "One Zambia, One Nation" coined by Kaunda. Following the introduction of a multiparty system in the early 1990s, Kaunda was defeated in the 1991 Zambian general election. Zambia has since continued to experience peaceful transitions of power. Natural resources in Zambia include minerals, wildlife, forestry, freshwater, and arable land. As of an estimate in 2018, 47.9% of the population is affected by multidimensional poverty. The Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) is headquartered in Lusaka.
Etymology
The territory of Zambia was known as "Northern Rhodesia" from 1911 to 1964. It was renamed "Zambia" in October 1964 on its independence from British rule. The name "Zambia" derives from the Zambezi river (Zambezi may mean "the grand river").
Geography
Zambia is a landlocked country in southern Africa, with a tropical climate, and consists mostly of high plateaus with some hills and mountains, dissected by river valleys. At 752,614 square kilometres (290,586 sq mi), it is the 39th-largest country in the world. The country lies mostly between latitudes 8° and 18°S, and longitudes 22° and 34°E. Zambia is drained by two major river basins: the Zambezi/Kafue basin in the centre, west, and south covering about three-quarters of the country; and the Congo basin in the north covering about one-quarter of the country. An area in the northeast forms part of the internal drainage basin of Lake Rukwa in Tanzania. In the Zambezi basin, there are rivers flowing wholly or partially through Zambia: the Kabompo, Lungwebungu, Kafue, Luangwa, and the Zambezi, which flows through the country in the west and then forms its southern border with Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe. Its source is in Zambia and it diverts into Angola, and a number of its tributaries rise in Angola's central highlands. The edge of the Cuando River floodplain (not its main channel) forms Zambia's southwestern border, and via the Chobe River. Two of the Zambezi's longest and largest tributaries, the Kafue and the Luangwa, flow mainly in Zambia. Their confluences with the Zambezi are on the border with Zimbabwe at Chirundu and Luangwa town respectively. Before its confluence, the Luangwa River forms part of Zambia's border with Mozambique. From Luangwa town, the Zambezi leaves Zambia and flows into Mozambique, and eventually into the Mozambique Channel.
In Eastern Zambia the plateau which extends between the Zambezi and Lake Tanganyika valleys is tilted upwards to the north, and so rises imperceptibly from about 900 metres (3,000 ft) in the south to 1,200 metres (3,900 ft) in the centre, reaching 1,800 metres (5,900 ft) in the north near Mbala. These plateau areas of northern Zambia have been categorised by the World Wildlife Fund as a large section of the Central Zambezian miombo woodlands ecoregion. The Luangwa Valley splits the plateau in a curve north-east to south-west, extended west into the heart of the plateau by the deep valley of the Lunsemfwa River. Hills and mountains are found by the side of some sections of the valley, including in its north-east the Nyika Plateau (2,200 metres or 7,200 feet) on the Malawi border, which extend into Zambia as the Mafinga Hills, containing the country's highest point, Mafinga Central (2,339 metres or 7,674 feet).
Climate
Zambia is located on the plateau of Central Africa, between 1,000 and 1,600 metres (3,300 and 5,200 ft) above sea level. The average elevation of 1,200 metres (3,900 ft) gives the land a generally moderate climate. The climate of Zambia is tropical, modified by elevation. In the Köppen climate classification, most of the country is classified as humid subtropical (Cfa) or tropical wet and dry (Aw), with stretches of semi-arid steppe climate (BSh) in the south-west and along the Zambezi valley. The two main seasons are the rainy season (November to April) corresponding to summer, and the dry season (May/June to October/November), corresponding to winter. The dry season is subdivided into the cool dry season (May/June to August), and the hot dry season (September to October/November). The modifying influence of altitude gives the country subtropical weather rather than tropical conditions during the cool season of May to August.
Biodiversity
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