LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Africa
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West Africa has been a major contributor to world cuisine in terms of the migration of its indigenous crops, methods of production of those crops, and culinary customs. Very few of Africa's currently known native food plants have received the recognition or research deserved and warranted for so vast a larder. The scientific community has not been able to provide an exact count of foods actually native to the continent nor the age of most of its crops. The history of the continent's flora is, therefore, virtually unknown. As with environments threatened with endangered species, Africa's indigenous agricultural pantry is gradually dwindling due to lack of research and interest. Many biases exist against native African foods, biases that have kept alive perceptions of the inferiority of African crops.
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Few nations in Africa have been able to sustain democratic governments, and many have instead cycled through a series of brutal coups and military dictatorships. A number of Africa's post-colonial political leaders were military generals who were poorly educated and ignorant on matters of governance. Great instability... was mainly the result of marginalization of other ethnic groups and graft under these leaders. Many politicians used the positions of power to ignite ethnic conflicts that had been exacerbated, or even created, by colonial rule. In many countries, the military was perceived as being the only group that could effectively maintain order, and it ruled many nations in Africa during the 1970s and early 1980s. During the period from the early 1960s to the late 1980s, Africa had more than 70 coups and 13 presidential assassinations.
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Africa has few inlets or natural harbors and a small number of offshore islands that are largely volcanic in origin. Madagascar is the largest island, with an area of 250,000 mi2 (650,000 km2).
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Lighting Africa is holding its first global business conference for off-grid lighting in Africa, in Accra, Ghana, 5-8 May, 2008. Program includes announcement of the Development Marketplace winners, opportunities to establish business partnerships, and more! For more information and to register
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Air fares to Africa can be very expensive, but there are ways to save. Don't, for example, fly from London to a former French colony, or conversely from Paris to a former British colony. That could easily cost thousands more. Instead, get a cheap ticket from London to Paris (or vice versa) and fly to Africa from there. Always book the Africa portion of travel first, be sure to allow lots of connection time, and note that London and Paris both have multiple international airports.
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Africa is considered by most paleoanthropologists to be the oldest inhabited territory on Earth, with the human species originating from the continent. During the middle of the twentieth century, anthropologists discovered many fossils and evidence of human occupation perhaps as early as 7 million years ago. Fossil remains of several species of early apelike humans thought to have evolved into modern man, such as Australopithecus afarensis (radiometrically dated to approximately 3.9–3.0 million years BC),[11] Paranthropus boisei (c. 2.3–1.4 million BC)[12] and Homo ergaster (c. 600,000–1.9 million BC) have been discovered.[1]
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