ABSTRACT
Botswana is a landlocked country with borders shared with Zimbabwe, South Africa, Namibia and Zambia (see Figure 7.1). The land area is approx. 580,000 km2, but most of its population of 1.2 million live in the eastem margin drained by the Limpopo River. In the north-west is the Okavango delta, an inland swamp arising from the River Okavango which drains inland from Angola; this swamp is one of the most remarkable wildlife areas anywhere in the world. The remaining two-thirds of Botswana is occupied by the sands of the Kalahari Desert where surface water is present only after the rains, and then only in ‘pans’ (shallow depressions). Rainfall is variable and generally comes in short, intensive bursts; from 1982 to 1986 there was a major drought.
