2014
Botswana in detail
1:
The story
Botswana, officially “Republic of Botswana”, is totally surrounded by other countries in the
south of Africa with over 2.098.000 inhabitants. It is surrounded by the Namibia, Zimbabwe,
Zambia, South Africa and Kazungula. The Botswanese economy - one of the strongest in
Africa - is dominated by the diamond industry. The main and biggest city of Botswana is
Gaborone and lays in the south-east.
Demography
Botswana is in the top 20 with the world-highest death-rate. For every 1000 babies, on
average 13.32 will die before the age of 4. Another fact in Botswana is that the average of
Botwanese income is: $16,400 (2013 est.). Why so little? Well, the environment, trade,
economy and the life expectancy play a role in the income of the Botswanese population.
The soil is not very fertile, as a consequence the agriculture will decrease. And a
consequence of decreasing agriculture there is less trade, and less trade causes less income.
AIDS
Botswana is one of the biggest victims of
AIDS and HIV. In only ten years, the life
expectancy got from an average of 65
years to a very low 35 years. This is a very
steady drop. The Ministry of Health
therefore required all schools to give their
children lessons to have safe nightly. The
year 2016, removing AIDS and HIV from
their country is the highest priority,
according to the president of the country.
FIGURE 1 SOURCE: WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION
Tidbits
•
According to a report in 2007 there are more African elephants in Botswana than anywhere else.
•
•
The number of elephants in Botswana was given as 133,829, with Tanzania in second place on
108,816 elephants.
In the !Xoo language of Botswana and Namibia, spoken by about 4,000 people, there are 112
distinct sounds (there are about 40 in English).
The ! at the start of !Xoo represents one of the five basic click sounds in the language.
•
The inhabitants of Botswana call themselves ‘Batswana’, of which the singular is ‘Motswana’.
•
Botswana is the world’s third-biggest diamond producer, behind Russia and Canada, and has the
second-highest AIDS/HIV rate behind Swaziland.
•
BOTSWANA IN DETAIL
2:
Working force in The
Netherlands
3%
22%
75%
Working force in Botswana
Primary sector
Secondary sector
Services sector
36%
Primary sector
Secondary sector
62%
Services sector
Conclusion (data from CIA.GOV)
The conclusion we can draw consists out of several different parts
•
Phase in de demographic transition model
o Phase 2: people don’t get that old, and many children are still being born due to lack of
social services
Total dependency ratio Botswana: 58.6% (80:20 division)
•
Total dependency ratio of The Netherlands: 52.8% (50:50 division)
•
The conclusion we can draw from this is that rich countries have more people working in their service
sector due to their development and higher literacy rating. Rich countries also have more immigrants then
poorer countries. Poor countries have a higher death rate due to diseases and not that good living
conditions, so people don’t get that old.
Data from CIA.GOV
Country
Literacy
AIDS-injections
Hospital beds
NO= of migrants
BOTSWANA IN DETAIL
Comparison between countries
Botswana
The Netherlands
85.1%
99.9%
23% of all inhab.
0.2% of all inhab.
1.8/1000 inhab.
4.7/1000 inhab
4.62/1000 inhab.
1.97/1000 inhab.
2%