Category Archives: Africa

Sexual Well-Being Around the World

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Durex, the condoms manufacturing company, conducted a survey of 26,000 people in 26 countries, asking about their sexual well-being. The results are summarized in an interactive map that allows you to see how each participant countries rates in terms of frequency of sex versus sexual satisfaction levels. For Nigeria, for example, 53% of respondents were having sexual intercourse weekly, with 67% reported being satisfied. For Greece, 87% of respondents were having sexual intercourse weekly, with 51% being satisfied. For Japan, 34% of respondents were having sexual intercourse weekly, the lowest amongst the participant countries, with only 15% being satisfied, also the lowest rate of the surveyed populations.

For the interactive map, visit: Durex: Sexual Wellbeing Survey – Frequency of Sex versus Satisfaction Levels

 

The Most Corrupt Countries in the World

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The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) just released for 2012 by Transparency International ranks 176 nations according to the perceived corruption levels of their public institutions. The CPI uses a scale of 0-100, 0 being the most corrupt and 100 the least corrupt. For 2012 the most corrupt countries, ranking at the bottom with a score of 8, are Somalia, North Korea and Afghanistan. At the other end of the spectrum, ranking at the top with a score of 90 are Denmark, Finland and New Zealand.

The CPI is a composite index based on a combination of surveys and assessments of corruption compiled by different reputable institutions worldwide.

See complete report: Transparency International – 2012 Corruption Perceptions Index

 

Terrorism Around the World

The Global Terrorism Index (GTI) ranks 158 countries based on the impact of terrorism in each of these countries. The rankings goes from 1 to 10, 1 being the lowest impact of terrorism and 10 the highest impact of terrorism. For 2011, the countries ranked at the top are Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, followed by Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria, Thailand, Russia, the Philippines, Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia and Syria.

The GTI uses four indicators to measure the impact of terrorism: number of incidents, number of deaths, injuries and property damage. A five year weighted average is also used in order to measure the lasting impact of terrorism in a particular country.

For more details see: Vision of Humanity – Global Terrorism Index

 

Malaria Around the World

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Malaria, a mosquito-borne infectious disease, affects 100 countries worldwide. It is mostly present in semi-tropical and tropical poor areas of Africa, South and Central America, and Asia. Of the 100 affected countries, 35 are located in Africa. Africa is the region most affected because its hot and humid weather makes transmission possible all year round. Lack of resources makes prevention and control of the disease very difficult. 89% of the malaria deaths worldwide occur in Africa.

Related Links:

 

Life Expectancy vs. Fertility Rates Worldwide 1960-2010

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During the last fifty years, we have seen the gradual increase in life expectancy and the corresponding decrease in fertility rates worldwide. This is clearly the case of countries like China, India, the United States, Brazil, Japan, and Gabon, where dramatic improvements can be seen. On the other hand, countries like Russia, South Africa and Afghanistan, show moderate improvement.

It is very interesting to note, that although they have improved, a large cluster of African countries remain far from the overall trend, with lower life expectancy rates and higher fertility rates. For more information, check Google’s interactive bubble chart based on World Bank data.

 

Armed Conflicts in Africa

Map of armed conflicts in Africa 1997-2011

According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Dataset (ACLED), the number of civil wars across the developing world has decreased over the past fifteen years, but the levels of political violence have remained relatively stable. As the number of battles decreased, riots, protests, and violence against civilians increased. To get a better understanding of the geographical distribution of violent incidents in Africa, Francisco Dans used ACLED data to create the map displayed above. The map shows all the incidents captured by ACLED between 1997 and 2011.

Freedom of the Press Around the World in 2012

2012 has seen positive and negative changes in freedom of the press around the world. Reporters Without Borders, the largest organization that advocates freedom of the press worldwide, compiles a Press Freedom Index where countries ranking at the top score high in press freedom, and countries at the bottom constitute the most repressive in terms of freedom of information and violence against journalists.

Some countries ranking at the top include Finland, Norway and Estonia. Countries at the bottom include Eritrea, North Korea and Turkmenistan. Countries showing improvements worth noting include Tunisia, South Sudan and Niger. In Latin America, Brazil showed the biggest decline.

Africa’s Resource Curse or Blessing

Energy Production for Select African Countries  (1960-2010)

The discovery of resources in developing countries has usually been more of a curse than a blessing for their economies, benefiting certain groups but not most of the population. Will this be the case for some African countries where resources have been recently discovered? Read more below:

  1. Energy Production of Select African Countries [IndexMundi]
  2. From Resource Curse to Blessing – Joseph Stiglitz [Project Syndicate]
  3. Beating the Resource Curse in Africa: A Global Effort – Terra Lawson-Remer and Joshua Greenstein [Council on Foreign Relations]
  4. Can New Oil States in Africa Avoid the ‘Resource Curse?’ Gabe Joselow [Voice of America News]
  5. Africa Must Tap Into Unused Resources – Kibaki – Wambui Ndonga [AllAfrica.com]
  6. Mining could spur Africa’s industrialization, but resource-curse risks persist – Terence Creamer [Engineering News]

The True Size of Africa

true size of africa

Most maps do not show the true size of Africa due to the way they represent the surface of the Earth (a sphere) on a flat surface (the map). To illustrate the point, Kai Krause recently created a map which showed the outlines of other countries crammed inside the outline of the African continent. The Economist created a more accurate version of Krause’s map using a different type of map projection. The results are shown in the image above.