Haley+Mauritius+2A

Welcome to Mauritius! This country is only 778 sq miles! That's only 1/4877 of the USA's size, which is 3,794,100 sq. mile. But even though it may be a small country, the peope do not have small hearts. Their motto is: " Star and Key of the Indian Ocean." And they truly are, being right in the center of the indian ocean. Even with their country so small, the average person a year makes $11,296-their GDP-a year which is pretty good when there are 82 people per square mile! In the US, the average person makes $45,592-their GDP-a year, with 1,642 people per square mile-oh and by the way, GDP means Gross Domestic Policy, and it's the average money a person makes a year. If you were planning on visiting here, you will not be able to pay in dollars, but Rupees! We americans are in luck if we do want to visit Mauritius someday because there the people speak English and French! They also speak the language Mauritian Creole. The Mauritius literacy rate is 88%, wheras the US' is only 11% more than that, 99%. Not to shabby!

Mauritius' national flag consists of 4 horizontal stripes, the colors red, blue, yellow, and green. Each color means something different. Red= the struggle for independence, Blue= the Indian Ocean, Yellow= a bright future, and Green= vegatation. It was most recentaly adopted on January 9th, 1968.

Here are some Health facts about Mauritius: The life expectany for women is 76 years of life and men's life expectancy is 69 years of life. In the US, women's life expectancy is 81 years of life and men's is 77 years of life. So in the US, we live a bit longer, by an average of 7.5 years! The Birth Rate in Mauritius is that for every 1,000 births, 14.17 babies die, and in the US, for every 1,000 births, 13.83 babies die. Only different by about .34 babies! Another health fact about Mauritius could be about there infant mortality: for Mauritius it's every 12 out of 1,000 babies, whereas in the US it's half that, or every 6 out of 1,000 babies. Mauritius' Political leader is that of Sir Anerood Jugnauth and their type of government is a Parlimentary represenative democratic republic. This means that the Presidant is the head of the state, and Prime Minister is the head of government, but he is assisted by a council of Ministers. Mauritius runs in a Multi-party system. This means that the government takes care of the Executive Power, and both the government and National Assembly take care of the Legislative power. But the big, big power, is shared by the Presidant and Prime Minister. Now the US is a bit different from that, our government is a national government of the federation of fifty states. The three disinct branches of government are a legislative, an executive, and a judicracy. So as you can see we run a bit differently then the people of Mauritius.

Mauritius is made up of many different kinds of religions. 52% of the country is Hindu, Roman Catholics make up 28%, there are 8.6% of other Christians, 16.6% is Muslim, and 0.4% of Mauritius' people are non-religious.

The way that Mauritius makes their money is in a variety of ways. 25% of how they make their money is from the sugarcanes that grow on 90% of their land! That means that their sugar grows on700.2 sq. miles of the Mauritius land! That's a lot of sugarcane! And of course with plenty to spare, you know people will want to buy the sugarcane! There's also tourists...and well...there's not much to say there,21 I mean it's tourists...and boy they spend money! Mauritius has attracted over 9,000 offshore entites-mostly concerning India and South Africa-and that has made them over 1 BILLION DOLLARS! That's a lot of money! And also companies from other countries come to Mauritius and place all of their things there. Things like: electrical equipment, telecommunications-telephones, fuel, cement and gypsum products. So I hope now that you at least have a vague idea of how Mauritius earns all of it's money!

One last thing I would like to inform you about is Mauritius' History. So here is a brief discreption: In the beginning the island was known by Swahali, Arab, and Malay sailors as early as the 10th century and its original name was Dina Harobi, by the Arabs. In 1638, the Dutch created the first permanent settlement. But because of the rough weat-including cyclones and the fact that the island was deteriorating!-the Dutch abandoned the island after about a century in 1710. But then the French took control of Mauritius-still Dina Harobi at the time-in 1715 and later changed the name to lle de France (Isle of France). Under the Frenches rule, the island started to to grow and rely on sugarcane. Then in the Naponeonic Wars (1830-1815 the British set out to gain control of the island. Even though the French had one won the Battle of Grand Port, the French surrendered to a British invasion at Cap Malheureux just three months later. They formally surrendered on December 3rd, 1810, but with terms that the the settlers had to keep their land and property, and to use the French language and laws of France for their criminal and civil decisions. Mauritius then went ton to become independent in 1968. It finally became a republic in 199

Thank you for reading-and hopefully enjoying!-my Country page, and again, Welcome to Mauritius!

//**__References__**__:__// Google Earth

CIA World Factbook

Culture Grams, Mauritius

Africa Maps

Wikipedia

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