Zambezi River Basin

Overview of the Zambezi

The Zambezi River flows over a distance of almost 3 000 kilometres, dropping in altitude from its source in the Kalene Hills in the north- western district of Solwezi in Zambia at 1 585 metres above sea level, to its delta in the Indian Ocean, 200 kilometres north of the Mozambican port of Beira (Chenje 2000).

southeastern Angola and northern Zambia onto a low-gradient area that forms the Barotse floodplain. From the Ngonye Falls, the river steepens, collecting water frommore tributaries, including the Cuando-Chobe River that drains southern Angola and Namibia’s Caprivi Strip. Three hundred kilometres downstream, the river drops a dramatic 100 metres forming the Victoria Falls and marking the beginning of the river’s middle section (Moore and others 2007).

The Zambezi River has tributaries along both banks, and these drain portions of eastern and

Africa major river basins

Mediterranean Sea

Red Sea

SENEGAL

NIGER

CHAD

Lake Chad

NILE

VOLTA

TURKANA

JUBA-SHABELLE

OGOOUE

I N D I A N O C E A N

CONGO

AT L A N T I C O C E A N

Elevation

Metres

ZAMBEZI

500 1 000 1 500 2 000 3 000

OKAVANGO

0 200 -200

LIMPOPO

-1 000 -2 000 -3 000 -4 000 -5 000 -6 000

ORANGE

Main river basin

Zambesi river basin

RICCARDO PRAVETTONI GRID-ARENDAL 2011

Figure 1.1 There are 63 transboundary river basins in Africa, covering 64 per cent of the continent’s land area (UNEP 2010). The Zambezi basin is the fourth largest in Africa after the Congo, Nile and Niger River Basins (Mukosa and Mwiinga 2008).

4