ABSTRACT
Situated on the eastern African coast, the modern state of Tanzania grew out of a union in 1964 between Tanganyika and the islands of Zanzibar off its coast. Bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Kenya and the highest mountain in Africa, Kilimanjaro, to the northeast, and the states of Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi to the north and northwest, Zaire and Zambia to the west, and Malawi and Mozambique to the south, Tanzania boasts the three biggest lakes in Africa - Lake Victoria, Lake Tanganyika and Lake Nyasa in the northwest, west and southwest respectively. Tanzania's 939,800 square kilometres (362,900 square miles) is home to 120 different ethnic groups, each with distinct linguistic and cultural characteristics as well as several groups of Asian origin. Most of the country's exports go through Dar es Salaam on the east coast, the largest of the ports as well as the business and commercial capital. In 1994 Tanzania had an estimated population of
27.9 million, 35 per cent of whom were Muslim, 45 per cent Christian with another 20 per cent following traditional, mostly animist beliefs.
