Cameroon Environment - 2022

GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES 

Environment - current issues

waterborne diseases are prevalent; deforestation and overgrazing result in erosion, desertification, and reduced quality of pastureland; poaching; overfishing; overhunting

Environment - international agreements

party to: Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Kyoto Protocol, Climate Change-Paris Agreement, Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban, Desertification, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Tropical Timber 2006, Wetlands, Whaling

signed, but not ratified: Nuclear Test Ban

Air pollutants

particulate matter emissions: 65.26 micrograms per cubic meter (2016 est.)

carbon dioxide emissions: 8.29 megatons (2016 est.)

methane emissions: 30.71 megatons (2020 est.)

Climate

varies with terrain, from tropical along coast to semiarid and hot in north

Land use

agricultural land: 20.6% (2018 est.)

arable land: 13.1% (2018 est.)

permanent crops: 3.3% (2018 est.)

permanent pasture: 4.2% (2018 est.)

forest: 41.7% (2018 est.)

other: 37.7% (2018 est.)

Urbanization

urban population: 59.3% of total population (2023)

rate of urbanization: 3.43% annual rate of change (2020-25 est.)

total population growth rate v. urban population growth rate, 2000-2030

Revenue from forest resources

forest revenues: 2.5% of GDP (2018 est.)

Revenue from coal

coal revenues: 0% of GDP (2018 est.)

Major infectious diseases

degree of risk: very high (2020)

food or waterborne diseases: bacterial and protozoal diarrhea, hepatitis A, and typhoid fever

vectorborne diseases: malaria and dengue fever

water contact diseases: schistosomiasis

animal contact diseases: rabies

respiratory diseases: meningococcal meningitis

note: on 21 March 2022, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a Travel Alert for polio in Africa; Cameroon is currently considered a high risk to travelers for circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses (cVDPV); vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV) is a strain of the weakened poliovirus that was initially included in oral polio vaccine (OPV) and that has changed over time and behaves more like the wild or naturally occurring virus; this means it can be spread more easily to people who are unvaccinated against polio and who come in contact with the stool or respiratory secretions, such as from a sneeze, of an “infected” person who received oral polio vaccine; the CDC recommends that before any international travel, anyone unvaccinated, incompletely vaccinated, or with an unknown polio vaccination status should complete the routine polio vaccine series; before travel to any high-risk destination, the CDC recommends that adults who previously completed the full, routine polio vaccine series receive a single, lifetime booster dose of polio vaccine

Food insecurity

severe localized food insecurity: due to civil insecurity and population displacements - according to a March 2022 analysis, about 2.4 million people are projected to be severely food insecure between June and August 2022; this is mainly the result of conflict, sociopolitical unrest and high food prices (2022)

Waste and recycling

municipal solid waste generated annually: 3,270,617 tons (2013 est.)

municipal solid waste recycled annually: 13,082 tons (2009 est.)

percent of municipal solid waste recycled: 0.4% (2009 est.)

Major lakes (area sq km)

fresh water lake(s): Lake Chad (endorheic lake shared with Niger, Nigeria, and Chad) - 10,360-25,900 sq km
note - area varies by season and year to year

Major watersheds (area sq km)

Atlantic Ocean drainage: Congo (3,730,881 sq km), Niger (2,261,741 sq km)
Internal (endorheic basin) drainage: Lake Chad (2,497,738 sq km)

Major aquifers

Lake Chad Basin

Total water withdrawal

municipal: 246.8 million cubic meters (2017 est.)

industrial: 104.6 million cubic meters (2017 est.)

agricultural: 737 million cubic meters (2017 est.)

Total renewable water resources

283.15 billion cubic meters (2017 est.)

NOTE: The information regarding Cameroon on this page is re-published from the 2022 World Fact Book of the United States Central Intelligence Agency and other sources. No claims are made regarding the accuracy of Cameroon 2022 information contained here. All suggestions for corrections of any errors about Cameroon 2022 should be addressed to the CIA or the source cited on each page.