The people of Africa continue to face a high incidence of disease including malaria, sleeping sickness, and river blindness. Most of Africa s political boundaries were drawn at the beginning of the colonial period without regard for the human and physical geography of the areas they divided. This has caused numerous problems. Considerable economic development has occurred in many scattered areas of Africa, but much of the region s population continues to have little access to the goods and services of a world economy. Patterns of raw material exploitation and export routes set up during the colonial period still prevail in most of Black Africa.
Interregional connections are poor.
The region is rich in raw materials vital to industrialized economies. Africa has increasingly been drawn into the competition and conflict between the world s major powers. The continent contains almost half of the world s refugee population. Africa's population growth rate is by far the highest of any continent s, in spite of a difficult agricultural environment, numerous hazards and diseases, and periodic food shortages in certain areas. Some of the best land is used to produce such cash crops as coffee, tea, cocoa, and cotton for sale overseas.