| Beraketa | |
|---|---|
  Beraketa Location in Madagascar | |
| Coordinates: 24°11′S45°41′E / 24.183°S 45.683°E | |
| Country |  |
| Region | Androy |
| District | Bekily |
| Elevation [1] | 537 m (1,762 ft) |
| Population (2001) [2] | |
| • Total | 14,000 |
| Time zone | EAT (UTC3) |
Beraketa is a town and commune in Madagascar. It belongs to the district of Bekily, which is a part of Androy Region.
Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar, and previously known as the Malagasy Republic, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately 400 kilometres off the coast of East Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar and numerous smaller peripheral islands. Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from the Indian subcontinent around 88 million years ago, allowing native plants and animals to evolve in relative isolation. Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot; over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The island's diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by the encroachment of the rapidly growing human population and other environmental threats.
Districts are second-level administrative divisions of Madagascar below the regions. There are 114 districts in Madagascar. Districts are in their turn divided into communes; while some of the districts in urban areas and offshore islands each consist of only one commune, most of the districts are divided typically into 5–20 communes.
The Bekily District is a district in the Androy Region, located in southeastern Madagascar.
It is situated at the Route nationale 13, Ihosy to Tolagnaro.
Route nationale 13 is a primary highway in Madagascar of 493 km, running from Ihosy to Tolagnaro (Fort-Dauphin). It crosses the regions of Ihorombe, Androy and Anosy.
Ihosy[iˈusʲ] is a city with 16990 inhabitants (2004) in Ihorombe Region in central south Madagascar.
The population of the commune was estimated to be approximately 14,000 in 2001 commune census. [2]
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses include agriculture, business, and traffic censuses. The United Nations defines the essential features of population and housing censuses as "individual enumeration, universality within a defined territory, simultaneity and defined periodicity", and recommends that population censuses be taken at least every 10 years. United Nations recommendations also cover census topics to be collected, official definitions, classifications and other useful information to co-ordinate international practice.
Beraketa is served by a local airport. Primary and junior level secondary education are available in town. It is also a site of industrial-scale mining. [2]
The majority (80%) of the population of the commune are farmers. The most important crop is rice, while other important products are peanuts and cassava. Industry and services provide employment for 1% and 19% of the population, respectively. [2]
Rice is the seed of the grass species Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima. As a cereal grain, it is the most widely consumed staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in Asia. It is the agricultural commodity with the third-highest worldwide production, after sugarcane and maize.
The peanut, also known as the groundnut, goober, or monkey nut (UK), and taxonomically classified as Arachis hypogaea, is a legume crop grown mainly for its edible seeds. It is widely grown in the tropics and subtropics, being important to both small and large commercial producers. It is classified as both a grain legume and, due to its high oil content, an oil crop. World annual production of shelled peanuts was 44 million tonnes in 2016, led by China with 38% of the world total. Atypically among legume crop plants, peanut pods develop underground (geocarpy) rather than aboveground. With this characteristic in mind, the botanist Linnaeus named the species hypogaea, which means "under the earth."
Manihot esculenta, commonly called cassava, manioc, yuca, macaxeira, mandioca, aipim and Brazilian arrowroot, is a woody shrub native to South America of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae. It is extensively cultivated as an annual crop in tropical and subtropical regions for its edible starchy tuberous root, a major source of carbohydrates. Though it is often called yuca in Spanish and in the United States, it is not related to yucca, a shrub in the family Asparagaceae. Cassava, when dried to a powdery extract, is called tapioca; its fried, granular form is named garri.
