Water Always Wins

The size of the continent is difficult to grasp. Its fifty-four countries span an area almost twice the size of Russia, or more than three times the size of the United States. Today Africa’s population is 1.3 billion people. Compared with, say, India, where more than 1.4 billion occupy just one-tenth the area, that means there’s still a lot of room for other species. That Africa still has so much of its natural landscapes, including more free-flowing freshwater systems remaining than any other continent, is why its large mammals—elephants, giraffes, cheetahs, lions, gorillas, chimpanzees, rhinos—still survive here, for now.