Rwanda Country Info - Africa

Description and Basic Information

Rwanda with its capital Kigali is located in Africa (Central Africa, east of Democratic Republic of the Congo). It covers some 26,339 square kilometres (slightly smaller than Maryland) with 10,186,000 citizens. Kinyarwanda, English, French and Swahili (generic) are languages spoken by the majority in Rwanda (consider regional differences). Tanzania, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi and Uganda are bordering countries.

Rwanda is a relatively stable East African country, and easily accessible from Kenya and Uganda. It is relatively easy, safe and simple to travel around. Parc National des Volcans, home of the mountain gorillas, and the setting for Gorillas in the Mist author Dian Fossey's research. If you can afford it it's an excellent experience... even possible as a daytrip from Kigali.

Pictures from Capital (Kigali)

Photos provided by Panoramio are under the copyright of their owners.

About Rwanda

The terrain offers mostly grassy uplands and hills having relief being mountainous with altitude declining from west to east. The average density of population is about 386 per km². The climate in Rwanda can be described as temperate with two rainy seasons (February to April, November to January), mild in mountains with frost and snow possible. Possible natural disasters include periodic droughts or the volcanic Virunga mountains are in the northwest along the border with Democratic Republic of the Congo.

To reach someone in Rwanda dial +250 prior to a number. There are 33,500 installed telephones. And there are 2,429,000 registered mobile phones. The cellular networks operate on frequencies of 900 Mhz. Websites typically end with the top level domain ".rw". If you want to bring electric appliances (e.g. battery charger), keep in mind the local 230V - 50Hz. The following list are the 5 regions/states in Rwanda we know off.

Demographic Statistics

In the year 2010, the total Rwandan population grew at a rate of 2.82% (or by 311,557 citizens). With 112,660 deaths and 411,946 babies born, the natural increase rate lies at 2.71%. 12,272 persons more in total immigrated to the country than emmigrated.

An overview of age distribution in Rwanda: Each pair of bars represents a single age group (male/female). Each group is spanning 5 years. E.g. 0 to 5 years, 5 to 10 etc. and group "0 to 5" being at the left end and "100 +" at the right end of the chart.

Based on content from wikitravel.org. The original article can be found here based on the work of these users.
Geographic information is based on the data provided by geonames.org, CIA factsbook and Unesco.