


Did you know that:
- deserts cover a third of the earth's surface
- 13 per cent of the world's population live
in deserts
- evaporation rates in deserts are often 20
times the annual precipitation
- a temperature of 58° C (136.4° F) has been
recorded in the shade at Azizia in Libya
- no rain fell for over 40 years in the
Atacama desert in Chile
- night temperatures in some deserts can fall
below freezing
- sand dunes can reach heights of up to 300m
- sand covers less than 20 per cent of the
world's desert areas
- dust from the Sahara has occasionally been
carried as far afield as the UK and Germany
- the Sahara Desert accounts for around 8 per
cent of the world's land area
- there are an estimated 1,200 species of
plant to be found in the Sahara
- in the last 50 years the Sahara has spread
south to cover an extra 65 million hectares
photo courtesy of WWF-UK
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