Fun Fact Friday: Checkpoint 1 - South Africa

Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start. With time ticking away a-pace we better get our heads around where exactly it is we're going to. With two South Africans and a Zimbabwean (who has lived in South Africa) starting with South Africa may well be a tiny cheat but it is the starting point of the rally so there isn't really any other way to begin.

Yes it's the SA Flag

General Facts - as taken from the CIA World Factbook and some of my very own personal general knowledge (I know, you all want me on your next pub quiz team...)
President = Jacob Zuma
Governement Type = Republic, with administrative capital in Pretoria and 9 provinces.
National Symbol = Springbok

Total Area = 1,219,090 sq km - making it the 25th largest country in the world and it's slightly less than twice the size of Texas. It has 2,798 km of coastline and borders Botswana 1,840 km, Lesotho 909 km, Mozambique 491 km, Namibia 967 km, Swaziland 430 km, Zimbabwe 225 km. We will get to see 4 of these in our rally. Bazinga.

Population = 48,810,427 (July 2012 est.) - making it the 26th most populated country in the world.
Median Age = 25
Life expectancy at birth = 49
Interestingly the birth rate is negative at = -0.412% (2012 est.), making it 217th in the world.

We start the rally in Johannesburg which has the largest city population in SA of 3.607 million although interesting in 2010 it was estimated that 62% of the population lived in an urban area. This explains why the majority of the 17.67 million economically active people in the country work in services - 65% in fact. And at 173rd in the world unemplyoment is at 23.9%.

Now for fun facts! 1st contact news has some awesome unusual facts so here are a few of my favourites:
1. South Africa is now the only country in the world to have hosted the Soccer, Cricket and Rugby World Cup
2.What about beer? South African brewery SABMiller ranks – by volume – as the largest brewing company in the world. SABMiller supplies up to 50% of China’s beer.
3. South Africa is the only country in the entire world that has voluntarily abandoned its nuclear weapons programme.
4. There are more than 2000 shipwrecks off the South African coast, most dating back at least 500 years.
5. The Cape Floral Kingdom is one of the world’s six floral kingdoms – and the only one which is wholly contained within a single country.