Country Context and Background

Location, geography and topography

Somalia is located in the horn of Africa and is bordered by Kenya to the southwest, Ethiopia to the west and Djibouti to the far northwest in the Gulf of Aden. It lies between latitudes 2°S and 12°N, and longitudes 41° and 52°E. Strategically located at the mouth of the Bab el Mandeb gateway to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal, the country occupies the tip of a region. Somalia’s total land area is 637,660 km2 of which 30% is classified as desert land that is unsuitable for agricultural production, 45% is covered by rangelands suitable for livestock grazing, 14% is covered by forest or woodland, and the remaining 13% (8.1 million ha) is classified as arable land (Food and Agriculture Organization,1995). There are two main rivers in Somalia namely; the Juba and Shabelle. Both of them run from the Ethiopian Highlands south-easterly across Somalia to the Indian Ocean. The topography of the country consists of mainly of plateau that slopes to the Indian Ocean in the east and to the Gulf of Aden in the north.