The Far North region is one of the ten regions of Cameroon 2 and the most populated, located in the north of the country and bordering Chad and Nigeria . Its capital is the city of Maroua which today has more than 300,000 inhabitants.

Situation

The region is located in the north of the country between 10° and 13° North latitude and 14° and 16° East longitude . It borders six regions of Chad and two states of Nigeria .

Bordering regions of the Far North
 Borno  Lake Province  Hadjer-Lamis ,
N’Djamena
 Adamawa  Chari-Baguirmi
Northern Region  Mayo-Kebbi West  Mayo-Kebbi East
Subdivisions

Departments

The departments of the Far North region.

The region, made up of six departments 3 , covers an area of ​​34,246  km 2 and is home to more than 2,721,500 inhabitants 4 .

Department
Capital Area Population (2001)
Diamare
Maroua 4,665 566 921
Logone-et-Chari
Kousseri 12 133 405 035
Mayo-Danay
Yagoua 5 303 522 782
Mayo-Kani
Kaele 5,033 338 448
Mayo-Sava
Mora 2,736 313 413
Mayo-Tsanaga
Mokolo 4,393 574,864
Districts

The region has 47 districts 3 .

Communes

Detailed article: Commune (Cameroon) .

The region includes 1 urban community, 3 district municipalities and 44 municipalities 3 .

Traditional chiefdoms

The Far North region has 18 traditional 1st degree chiefdoms  , 160 2nd degree chiefdoms  and 1,821 3rd degree  chiefdoms 5 .

Géographie

Relief

The region includes the Mandara Mountains to the west, the Logone floodplains to the east ( yaéré ), the Mayo Kebbi peneplain to the south and Lake Chad to the north, the Far North region belongs in its great majority to the endorheic basin of Lake Chad. Only the Chari and its tributary the Logone are permanent. Advancing more and more narrowly towards the north between the borders of Chad and Nigeria its limits form largely natural, Logone River, Chari River, fallout from the Mandara Mountains on Nigeria , but not human.

Climat

The climate of the Far North of Cameroon is a Sudano-Sahelian climate characterized by a dry season that lasts seven months and a rainy season that lasts 5 months. Cold from November to February, followed by months of increasingly intense heat until the arrival of the rains. The climate is largely Sahelian with high temperatures and rainfall between 900 and 350 mm decreasing according to latitude from south to north. The heights (up to 1,400 meters) of the Mandara Mountains are cooler and significantly rainier. The months of July and August alone account for 2/3 of the total annual rainfall in the region 6 .

It is summer in the northern hemisphere, but due to the relative drop in temperatures and the intensity of the rains in July and August, this rainy season is often referred to as wintering. The rivers then overflow, making it difficult to travel outside the main roads.

Savannahs, more or less wooded depending on the latitude, cover the region while the flood plains are the domain of the prairie. It is the interannual irregularities that characterize the climate and regulate the work of men, mainly farmers, farmer-breeders and some nomadic Fulani Bororo on the shores of Lake Chad 7 .

Population and economy

Populations of the Far North region.

Its population (and therefore its density) has undergone a very strong evolution, going from 2,721,500 inhabitants in 2001 to 3,111,792 during the 2005 census. Its density went from 40.7 to 90.8 inhabitants per km2 between the 1974 census and that of 2005 8 . The growth of cities is exponential.

The Kapsiki Mountains in the Far North region. June 2017.
The Kousseri – Maroua road.
Maroua Street.

This population is very unevenly distributed between the overpopulated mountainous regions with densities exceeding 300 inhabitants per km2 in the Mandara Mountains and the Yaérés, a vast flood plain of the Logone, where densities are less than 10 inhabitants per km2 , which allowed the ancient establishment of the vast Waza National Park and, away from the floods, the smaller Kalamaloué National Park. Many ethnic groups occupy clearly identified areas whether in the mountains and plateaus of the Mandara ( Mafa (people) , Mofu (people) , Podoko , Kapsiki (people) , Mouktélé (people) , Vamé (people) , Brémé…) or in the plains ( Kotoko (people) , Toupouri (people) , Massa, Moundang (people) , Guisseye, Moussey (people) …). Formerly Islamized ethnic groups, the Fulani (in English: Fulas or Fulani; in Fulani: Fulɓe) in the center and the Choua Arabs (in the north) devote themselves more to livestock farming, some sedentary, others transhumant. Bororo Fulani nomads frequent the banks of Lake Chad. Other human groups, such as the Hausa and Borno, are more urban. Agriculture and livestock farming occupy 90% of the population. Supervised by Sodecoton , cotton growing is the major commercial export crop for fiber or for local consumption of oil for the seed. Food crops are intended for self-consumption or to feed the rapidly growing cities. Rice growing has developed widely with the various rice-growing areas created by SEMRY. Fishing, developed along the Logone, the Chari and in Lake Chad, benefited from the creation of the Maga 7 reservoir .

Lake Maga.
Fishing in Lake Maga.
Giraffes in Waza National Park.
Campsite near Waza Park, Far North of Cameroon.
Artisan architecture of the far north of Cameroon.
Mount Boboyo in the far north of Cameroon.
Culture

Traditional Dances

Toupouri dance group .
Toupouri Dance .
Podoko Festival ( Mora ).