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Malanje | |
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Coordinates: 9°32′S16°21′E / 9.533°S 16.350°E | |
Country | Angola |
Province | Malanje Province |
Area | |
• Total | 2,215 km2 (855 sq mi) |
Elevation | 1,155 m (3,789 ft) |
Population (mid 2020) [1] | |
• Total | 604,215 |
• Density | 270/km2 (710/sq mi) |
Time zone | UTC+1 (WAT) |
Climate | Aw |
Malanje is the capital city of Malanje Province in Angola, with a population of 455,000 (2014 census), [2] and a municipality, with a population of 506,847 (2014 census). Projected to be the thirteenth fastest growing city on the African continent between 2020 and 2025, with a 5.17% growth. [3] It is located 380 kilometres (240 mi) east of Angola's capital Luanda. Near it are the spectacular Calandula waterfalls, the rock formations of Pungo Andongo, and the Capanda Dam. The climate is mainly humid, with average temperatures between 20 and 24 °C (68 and 75 °F) and rainfall 900 to 130 millimetres (35.4 to 5.1 in) in the rainy season (October to April).
Portuguese settlers founded Malanje in the 19th century. The construction of the railway from Luanda to Malanje, in the fertile highlands, started in 1885. The area around Malanje included Portuguese West Africa's primary areas dedicated to the production of cotton, the crop that drove its development since the beginning. The town developed in the mid-19th century as an important slave market created in 1852. [4] Situated at an elevation of 1,134 metres (3,720 ft), [5] the town has a high-altitude tropical climate, ideal to several agricultural productions. The city developed as an important agricultural, manufacturing, trading and services centre. Its productions included cotton, textiles, coffee, fruit and corn. The Cangandala National Park was established by the Portuguese authorities in 1970, having previously been classified as an Integral Natural Reserve in 1963.
The withdrawal of the Portuguese in conjunction with Angola's independence in 1975, and, later, the Angolan Civil War (1975–2002), severely hampered the production of cotton as well as that of coffee and corn (maize). Malanje was partially destroyed during the civil war, but reconstruction efforts in the years following the end of the conflict have rebuilt the city and its surroundings.
Malanje has a tropical savanna climate (Köppen: Aw; Trewartha: Awbb).
Climate data for Malanje | |||||||||||||
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Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year |
Record high °C (°F) | 32 (90) | 33 (91) | 32 (90) | 31 (88) | 31 (88) | 31 (88) | 32 (90) | 33 (91) | 32 (90) | 32 (90) | 31 (88) | 31 (88) | 33 (91) |
Mean daily maximum °C (°F) | 27 (81) | 27 (81) | 28 (82) | 27 (81) | 29 (84) | 28 (82) | 29 (84) | 30 (86) | 29 (84) | 28 (82) | 27 (81) | 27 (81) | 28 (82) |
Daily mean °C (°F) | 21 (70) | 21 (70) | 22 (72) | 21 (70) | 21 (70) | 18 (64) | 19 (66) | 21 (70) | 22 (72) | 22 (72) | 21 (70) | 21 (70) | 21 (70) |
Mean daily minimum °C (°F) | 16 (61) | 16 (61) | 16 (61) | 16 (61) | 13 (55) | 9 (48) | 9 (48) | 12 (54) | 15 (59) | 16 (61) | 16 (61) | 16 (61) | 14 (57) |
Record low °C (°F) | 13 (55) | 11 (52) | 8 (46) | 11 (52) | 4 (39) | 4 (39) | 2 (36) | 5 (41) | 10 (50) | 12 (54) | 11 (52) | 11 (52) | 2 (36) |
Average precipitation mm (inches) | 80 (3.1) | 130 (5.1) | 190 (7.5) | 160 (6.3) | 10 (0.4) | 0 (0) | 0 (0) | 0 (0) | 50 (2.0) | 120 (4.7) | 200 (7.9) | 140 (5.5) | 1,130 (44.5) |
Source: weatherbase.com [6] |
Near the city is the Cangandala National Park, established by the Portuguese authorities on 25 June 1970, it was founded to protect the Giant Sable Antelope which were discovered in 1963. As far as religious buildings are concerned, there is the Evangelical Church at Quêssua and as for funerary constructions, the Tomb of the queen Ana de Sousa Nzinga Mbande and the tomb of José do Telhado, a local Robin Hood. José do Telhado was a Portuguese who was exiled to Portuguese Angola that in colonial days used to steal from rich whites and distribute to poor blacks. Worth visiting is the Forte de Cabatuquila in the city.
Malanje Airport was built during the colonial era. Currently, there are no flights to the capital Luanda.
The construction of the railway from Luanda to Malanje, in the fertile highlands, started in 1885. After the end of the civil war in 2002, it was expected to be the terminus of a railway from the capital city and port of Luanda once reconstruction was complete.
Luanda is the capital and largest city of Angola. It is Angola's primary port, and its major industrial, cultural and urban centre. Located on Angola's northern Atlantic coast, Luanda is Angola's administrative centre, its chief seaport, and also the capital of the Luanda Province. Luanda and its metropolitan area is the most populous Portuguese-speaking capital city in the world and the most populous Lusophone city outside Brazil. In 2020 the population reached more than 8.3 million inhabitants.
Bié is a province of Angola located on the Bié Plateau in central part of country. Its capital is Kuito, which was called Silva Porto until independence from Portugal in 1975. The province has an area of 70,314 square kilometres (27,148 sq mi) and a population of 1,455,255 in 2014. The current governor of Bié is José Amaro Tati.
Malanje is a province of Angola. It has an area of 97,602 km2 and a 2014 census population of 986,363. Malanje is the provincial capital.
Moçâmedes is a city in southwestern Angola, capital of Namibe Province. The city's current population is 255,000. Founded in 1840 by the Portuguese colonial administration, the city was named Namibe between 1985 and 2016. Moçâmedes has a cool dry climate and desert vegetation, because it is near the Namib Desert.
Uíge is one of the eighteen Provinces of Angola, located in the northwestern part of the country. Its capital city is of the same name.
Lubango, formerly known as Sá da Bandeira, is a municipality in Angola, capital of the Huíla Province, with a population of 914,456 in 2022. The city center had a population of 600,751 in 2014 making it the second-most populous city in Angola after the capital city Luanda.
Benguela is a city in western Angola, capital of Benguela Province. Benguela is one of Angola's most populous cities with a population of 555,124 in the city and 561,775 in the municipality, at the 2014 census.
Caconda is a town and a municipality in the province of Huíla, Angola. The municipality had a population of 167,820 in 2014.
The Ovimbundu, also known as the Southern Mbundu, are a Bantu ethnic group who live on the Bié Plateau of central Angola and in the coastal strip west of these highlands. As the largest ethnic group in Angola, they make up 38 percent of the country's population. Overwhelmingly the Ovimbundu follow Christianity, mainly the Igreja Evangélica Congregacional de Angola (IECA), founded by American missionaries, and the Catholic Church. However, some still retain beliefs and practices from African traditional religions.
Cuíto, formerly known as Silva Porto, is a city and municipality in central Angola, capital of Bié Province. The municipality had a population of 450,881 in 2014. Projected to be the tenth fastest growing city on the African continent between 2020 and 2025, with a 5.56% growth.
N'dalatando, formerly Vila Salazar, is a town, with a population of 161,584 (2014), and a commune in the municipality of Cazengo, province of Cuanza Norte, Angola.
Ondjiva, formerly Vila Pereira d'Eça, is a town, with a population of 121,537 (2014), and a commune in the municipality of Cuanhama, province of Cunene, Angola. It is also the administrative capital of Cunene Province and is located at the extreme south of the country, about 42 kilometres (26 mi) from the border with Namibia. It was traditionally the seat of the Ovambo king of the Oukwanyama tribe. Ondjiva was greatly affected by the Angolan Civil War (1975-2002).
The giant sable antelope, also known in Portuguese as the palanca negra gigante, is a large, rare subspecies of the sable antelope native and endemic to the central highlands of Angola, occurring specifically in two areas: Cangandala National Park and Luando Natural Strict Reserve.
Rail transport in Angola consists of three separate Cape gauge lines that do not connect: the northern Luanda Railway, the central Benguela Railway, and the southern Moçâmedes Railway. The lines each connect the Atlantic coast to the interior of the country. A fourth system once linked Gunza and Gabala but is no longer operational.
The Luanda Railway is a 424 km (263 mi) single-track Cape gauge railway line from the Angolan capital of Luanda to Malanje. A branch line departs the railway at Zenza do Itombe for Dondo. The line is operated by the state owned company Caminho de Ferro de Luanda E.P., short CFL EP.
Angola is a potentially rich agricultural country, with fertile soils, a favourable climate, and about 57.4 million ha of agricultural land, including more than 5.0 million ha of arable land. Before independence from Portugal in 1975, Angola had a flourishing tradition of family-based farming and was self-sufficient in all major food crops except wheat. The country exported coffee and maize, as well as crops such as sisal, bananas, tobacco and cassava. By the 1990s Angola produced less than 1% the volume of coffee it had produced in the early 1970s, while production of cotton, tobacco and sugar cane had ceased almost entirely. Poor global market prices and lack of investment have severely limited the sector since independence.
In southwestern Africa, Portuguese Angola was a historical colony of the Portuguese Empire (1575–1951), the overseas province Portuguese West Africa of Estado Novo Portugal (1951–1972), and the State of Angola of the Portuguese Empire (1972–1975). It became the independent People's Republic of Angola in 1975.
Cangandala is a town and municipality in the province of Malanje (Malange) in Angola. It covers an area of 5,770 square kilometres (2,230 sq mi) and its population is 45,120.
The history of rail transport in Angola began during the nineteenth century, when Angola was a colony of Portugal. It has involved the construction, operation and destruction of four separate, unconnected, coast-to-inland systems, in two different gauges. Operations on three of those systems have been largely restored; the other system has been closed.