The African Plateau.

A plateau is a large area of land of high elevation but which is generally flat. The biggest parts of Africa consist of the plateau and this is made of crystalline rocks, which are millions of years old.
These rocks are generally stable but can only break or crack when subjected to high forces of compression or tension.
 
Elevation: Highest, Kilimanjaro in Tanzania (5,895)-Lowest Assel in Djibouti, (155 metres) below sea level.
 
The surface of the African plateau is uniform and flat in most parts of the continent. This gives an impression of great monotony. The general altitude of the African plateau is 300 metres above sea level. There are isolated, steep sided residual hills known as Inselbergs. These Inselbergs are the last remnants of earlier and higher surfaces of the plateau, which have been left by erosion, weathering and mass wasting.
 
Map of Africa showing high lands, plateau areas and lowlands.
The African plateau is made up of different plateau surface at different levels, found at different altitudes and they are separated by steep scarp-like steps. The basement rocks of these plateau surfaces are of deferring ages. This implies that their formation did not take place at the same time but in stages, each stage separated by long periods when forces of erosion had more time to smooth down the surface.
 
Plateaux result from long periods of erosion which, having won down the continental block have caused it to rise slowly over thousands of years, re-adjusting itself to the redistributed weight of the eroded sediments. This is known as isostatic re-adjustment.
 
The highest rise of the African plateau is in the East and South and slope down wards to the west.
 
Apart from Inselbergs, the monotony of the African plateau is also broken by rivers, which have cut steep sided gorges through the plateau due to the uplift. A gorge is a deep, narrow, steep sided river valley.
 
The high areas of the African plateau include:
  • the Ethiopian highlands,
  • Cameroon highlands,
  • the Jos plateau,
  • East African highlands among others.

IDevice Icon Activity

On the map of Africa below:

  1. Name Mountains numbered 1 to 4.
  2. Also label the highland areas 5 to 12.
  3. Try to find out the highest points of these places.

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