Interesting facts about Gabon

07/02/2023

07/02/2023

The natural nuclear reactor at Oklo, the Gabonese uranium deposit, is a unique phenomenon. About 1.8 billion years ago, a spontaneous chain reaction of fission of uranium nuclei began here. This phenomenon was discovered in 1972, but nowadays the reaction has already stopped.
About 80% of Gabon is covered by jungle. Unfortunately, due to uncontrolled deforestation, the forest area is slowly but surely declining.
Sand for beaches and artificial islands of the UAE is exported from Gabon.
Libreville, the Gabonese capital, was founded by 52 former slaves freed from a Portuguese ship. That is why they named the new settlement “Free City”.
The largest population of gorillas in the world lives in Gabon.

07/02/2023

It's not worth taking pictures here. Shooting photos and videos is prohibited by law in many places, and local residents can react extremely negatively to attempts to photograph them.
Palm moonshine is very popular in Gabon. The reason for this popularity is simple - the availability of raw materials and the low cost of the final product.
Passing through the whole country, the Transgabon railway is the only one built in Central Africa since the countries of this mainland gained independence.
The average salary in Gabon is unprecedentedly high by African standards, about $500-600. But in practice, these are just numbers - the wealthy minority earns a lot of money , and the poor majority live on $ 50-100 a month.
About 2.7% of the country's territory is occupied by national parks, reserves and other protected areas.

07/02/2023

Most of the Gabonese are Christians, but about a quarter of the entire local population professes traditional African cults.
Gabon is one of the most urbanized African countries. The share of the urban population here has long exceeded 85%.
About 120 oil and natural gas fields have been explored on the territory of this country.
Huge reserves of iron ore have also been explored in the Gabon subsoil, but metallurgy and the steel industry are practically not developed here.
Pygmies live in the central part of Gabon, the shortest people on Earth. The average height of the pygmies is about 130 cm.

07/02/2023

In all of Gabon, slightly more people live than in Novosibirsk , about 1.8 million people. For comparison, in the Nigerian city of Lagos only officially live about 13.8 million people, and unofficially, according to some estimates, up to 20 million, which makes it the most populous city on the entire African continent.
Thanks to the developed oil production, Gabon is among the top 5 countries in Africa in terms of GDP, but most of the population here lives below the poverty line due to monstrous social inequality. The stratification of the rich and the poor is very bright here, and luxurious houses are adjacent to the creepy-looking slums.
The name "Gabon" itself comes from the Portuguese "Gabão" - this word was used by Portuguese explorers to name the river Mbe flowing here. "Gabão" is Portuguese for "hooded river". The Portuguese so called it because of the specific shape of the mouth.
The official language of Gabon, a former colony of France, is French. But many locals do not speak it, preferring local languages. The most common language here is the Bantu and its local dialects.
Most of the languages ​​spoken in Gabon do not have a written form. It was created for them on the basis of the Latin alphabet back in the 19th century, but, apparently, something did not grow together.