According to abbreviationfinder, Accra is the largest city and capital of the African country of Ghana and is both the capital of the Greater Accra region, and the district of the Accra metropolitan area. The city is a modern metropolis that constitutes the administrative, communications and economic center of the country.
History
The city served as a commercial center with the Portuguese, who built a fort in the area and later in the late 17th century it expanded to the Swedes, Dutch, British and Danes.
The city was developed around the original town and the British, Dutch and Danish fortifications and the residences where the residents of the respective countries lived like Jamestown near the British fort; Osu, near the Danish Christianborg fort (now Christiansborg Castle); and Usshertown, near the Dutch fort of Ussher. Today these four areas make up the center of the modern city.
In 1862 the city was shaken by a strong earthquake which caused great damage. In 1877, after the Second Anglo-Asante War, the city replaced Cape Coast as the capital of the British colony of the Gold Coast and with the consolidation of the railroad to the mining and agricultural areas, Accra became the economic heart of Ghana.
In 1939 the city was once again shaken by another strong earthquake that greatly affected it.
In 1948 the Accra Riots launched a campaign for independence from the United Kingdom. Today Accra is one of the most modern cities on the African continent.
Geography
It has 185 km 2 of extension and has more than 2,029,143 residents according to the 2006 census and is located between the coordinates 5 ° 30′N 0 ° 13′W? /? 5.5, -0.217.
Economic development
About 70% of the capacity is domestically manufactured and it houses the Commercial Bank of Ghana building. See population of Ghana.
The economy is based on communications, construction, transportation, government and financial services, and the primary sector, especially fishing.
Most of the industrial development is located in the metropolitan area and has cocoa processing plants, the chemical industry, cement factories, aluminum smelters, steel plants and oil refining plants.
Social development
Culture
It’s found:
- The National Museum
- The Academy of Arts and Sciences
- The National Archives and the Central Library.
Of note is the Christianborg Fort or Osu Castle, which is the residence of the President, which was built by the Danes in the seventeenth century. Also noteworthy are the University of Ghana, the National Theater, the Accra National Cultural Center, the lighthouse, the Ohene Djan stadium, the Kwame Nkrumah memorial park and its many beaches.
Education
In the city, all levels of education are developed, including the university, the University of Ghana is located. On the outskirts of town are two high schools, the Achimota High School founded in 1924 and the Presbyterian Boys High School. Another institution of higher studies, the Ashesi University, was recently held.
Sports
Several sports are developed and one of the most practiced both in the city and in the country is soccer, in which Ghana has a high continental and international prestige.
Etymology
“Accra” comes from ” Nkran “, which means “ants” in the Acano language, which is explained by the abundance of anthills in the area.
Ghana Economy
Industry
Ghana has, compared to most African countries, a relatively well developed industrial sector. However, the factories are generally small. There are numerous printers and publishing houses, there are also a number of sawmills and furniture factories.
Large-scale industries produce beer, cigarettes, soft drinks, edible oils, cloves, oxygen, acetylene, and aluminum foil. The industrial zone of Tema, a port city east of Accra, is home to an oil refinery.
There is an aluminum smelter that uses energy produced by the Volta River project, which produced some 20,000 tonnes of metal a year in the late 1980s. Other products are textiles, footwear, iron and steel, sugar, flour and glass. In the mid- 1980s, a large privatization program began.
Farming
The main exported crop is cocoa, which is produced mainly in the Ashanti region.
Other goods such as coffee, palm hearts, butyrosperm or butter tree, coconut oil, copra, bananas, peanuts, kola (kola nut), palm oil and tobacco are exported. In the southwest, plantations of the rubber tree, from which rubber is obtained, have been introduced.
The most important food products in the south are tapioca, hearts of palm, palm oil, corn, plantain, peanuts and yams. Other crops include oleaginous fruits, rice, cotton and tobacco.
In the north, the butter tree is very widespread, producing seeds from which an edible fat called butter is obtained; yams, sorghum and corn are also grown. Peanuts and some legumes are grown in the northeast. Coconuts, coffee, bananas and citrus fruits are also grown along the coast.
Cattle raising
In the north, mainly cattle are raised. Other types of livestock are also raised; goats, sheep and poultry.
Forestry and fishing
Forests cover about 23% of the area of Ghana. Most of the wood production comes from areas outside the forest reserves, although production from the reserves is increasing.
The fishing industry has grown rapidly since the 1960s, some of which comes from inland waters (mainly from Lake Volta). There are fish markets with refrigeration facilities in Sekondi-Takoradi and Tema.
