Karonga is a township in the Karonga District in Northern Region of Malawi. Located on the western shore of Lake Nyasa, it was established as a slaving centre sometime before 1877. As of 2018 estimates, Karonga has a population of 61,609. The common and major language spoken in this district is the Tumbuka language language, which is also a regional language of Northern Malawi.
History
Pre-historic tools and remains of hominids discovered in Malawi's remote northern district of Karonga provides further proof that the area could be the cradle of humankind. Professor Friedemann Schrenk of the Goethe University in
Frankfurt told
Reuters that two students working on the excavation site in September 2009 had discovered prehistoric tools and a tooth of a hominid. "This latest discovery of prehistoric tools and remains of hominids provides additional proof to the theory that the Great Rift Valley of Africa and perhaps the excavation site near Karonga can be considered the cradle of humankind." Schrenk said. The site also contains some of the earliest dinosaurs which lived between 100 million and 140 million years ago and early hominids believed to have lived between a million and 6 million years ago. The discovery was at Malema excavation site from Karonga.
In terms of more recent prehistory, Karonga has an abundance of Pleistocene and Holocene archaeological materials dating especially to the Middle and Later Stone Ages, as well as the Iron Age.
Some time before 1877 Karonga existed as the stronghold of Mlozi, a famous Arab slaver.
Karonga Girls Secondary School was opened in the centre of the town in 1998.
On 11 July 2008 the Kayelekera mine in Karonga celebrated 1.5 million hours of accident-free uranium mining.
In December 2009 the area suffered a series of earthquakes.
Geography
Karonga is at an elevation of on the western shore of
Lake Nyasa. It is situated from
Kenan Ngomba, from Kaporo, from
Kilondo and from
Lupembe.
Demographics
|
| 1977 | 11,873 |
| 1987 | 19,667 |
| 1998 | 27,811 |
| 2008 | 40,334 |
| 2018 | 61,609 |
Languages
Tumbuka language is commonly used in Karonga for both home and school.
Karonga is known as "
an island of Tumbuka language and culture in a sea of Tumbuka and Ngonde people."
Economy
The economy of the area is based on cotton, rice and maize production along the lake and on coffee and livestock in the west.
Karongans are dependent on subsistence fishing.
Climate
Karonga's climate is classified as
tropical climate. The summers are much rainier than the winters in Karonga. The climate here is classified as Aw by the Köppen-Geiger system. In Karonga, the average annual temperature is 25.6 °C (78.8 °F).
Arts and culture
The Cultural & Museum Centre Karonga is Karonga's most popular attraction to tourists.
It is home to the
Malawisaurus, a 150-million-year-old fossil discovered south of the district.
[ It displays an exhibit entitled "From Dinosaurs to Democracy", which chronicles the area's history.][
]
Infrastructure
Karonga is home to the Karonga Airport[ which handles only daytime domestic flights for Air Malawi.][ a-z World Airports, accessed 9 August 2008] Buses travel from Mzuzu and Nkhata Bay to Karonga using the M1 road.
Notes
External links
