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Concept
Geography of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Summary
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is the largest country of sub-Saharan Africa, occupying some . Most of the country lies within the vast hollow of the Congo River basin. The vast, low-lying central area is a plateau-shaped basin sloping toward the west, covered by tropical rainforest and criss-crossed by rivers. The forest center is surrounded by mountainous terraces in the west, plateaus merging into savannas in the south and southwest. Dense grasslands extend beyond the Congo River in the north. High mountains of the Ruwenzori Range (some above ) are found on the eastern borders with Rwanda and Uganda (see Albertine Rift montane forests for a description of this area).
Several major geographic regions may be defined in terms of terrain and patterns of natural vegetation, namely the central Congo Basin, the uplands north and south of the basin, and the eastern highlands.
The country's core region is the central Congo Basin. Having an average elevation of about , it measures roughly , constituting about a third of the DRC's territory. Much of the forest within the basin is swamp, and still more of it consists of a mixture of marshes and firm land.
North and south of the basin lie higher plains and, occasionally, hills covered with varying mixtures of savanna grasses and woodlands. The southern uplands region, like the basin, constitutes about a third of the DRC's territory. The area slopes from south to north, starting at about near the Angolan border and falling to about near the basin. Vegetation cover in the southern uplands territory is more varied than that of the northern uplands. In some areas, woodland is dominant; in others, savanna grasses predominate. South of the basin, along the streams flowing into the Kasai River are extensive gallery forests. In the far southeast, most of the former Katanga Province is characterized by somewhat higher plateaus and low mountains. The westernmost section of the DRC, a partly forested panhandle reaching the Atlantic Ocean, is an extension of the southern uplands that drops sharply to a very narrow shore about long.
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