Lake Chad (Central Africa)

Description

Lying on the borders of Chad, Niger, Nigeria and Cameroon, Lake Chad has not lived up to its status as the 6 th largest freshwater lake in the world for a long time. While its area was 22,902 km 2 (half the size of Switzerland) in 1963, it had shrivelled like a dried skin to only 304 km 2 by 2001. The reason is a change in the climate which has resulted in more frequent and longer periods of drought.