North Bank Division was 33.2 per cent as of 2003. The Gambia is the smallest country in Africa, with the width of the country never exceeding . It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the west, while being surrounded by Senegal in all other directions. The Gambia River flows throughout the country and is the principal source of water and transport medium. The banks of the river have swampy beaches, while it has alluvial soil in all other parts, which is conducive for the growth of rice. Peanuts are the major cashcrop. The weather is usually warm and dry. The elevation of
History of the Gambia Gambia too. In 1943, Franklin D. Roosevelt, the President of the United States, stopped overnight in Bathurst en route to and from the Casablanca Conference. This marked the first visit to the African continent by a sitting US President. The visit hardened his views against British colonial rule. Appalled, as he was, by the poverty and disease that was present there, he wrote to Churchill describing the territory as a "hell-hole". After the Second World War, the pace of reform increased. The economy of the Gambia, like other African countries at the time, was very heavily orientated towards agriculture. Reliance