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Botswana
Independence
1966 Silver 50 Cents 27.4mm (10.00
grams) .800 Silver (0.2572 oz. ASW)
Reference: KM #1
BOTSWANA J.H.
WASER SERETSE KHAMA, Portrait of Sir Seretse Khama,the 1st. President of the
Republic of Botswana (1966-80). INDEPENDENCE 30 SEPTEMBER 1966 PULA B 50
CENTS, Botswanan Coat-of-Arms in centre. ‘B’ mintmark below.
You are bidding on the exact item pictured, provided with a Certificate of
Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of Authenticity.
  Botswana,
officially the Republic of Botswana (Setswana: Lefatshe la
Botswana), is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Formerly the
British protectorate of Bechuanaland, Botswana adopted its name after
becoming independent within the Commonwealth on 30 September 1966. Since
then, it has been a representative republic, with a consistent record of
uninterrupted democratic elections and the lowest perceived corruption
ranking in Africa since at least 1998. It is currently Africa’s oldest
continuous democracy.
Botswana is topographically flat, with up to 70
percent of its territory being the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South
Africa to the south and southeast, Namibia to the west and north, and
Zimbabwe to the northeast. Its border with Zambia to the north near
Kazungula is poorly defined but is, at most, a few hundred metres long.
A mid-sized country of just over 2.3 million people, Botswana is one of the
most sparsely populated countries in the world. Around 10 percent of the
population lives in the capital and largest city, Gaborone. Formerly one of
the poorest countries in the world-with a GDP per capita of about US$70 per
year in the late 1960s-Botswana has since transformed itself into one of the
world’s fastest-growing economies. The economy is dominated by mining,
cattle, and tourism. Botswana boasts a GDP (purchasing power parity) per
capita of about $18,825 per year as of 2015, which is one of the highest in
Africa. Its high gross national income (by some estimates the fourth-largest
in Africa) gives the country a relatively high standard of living and one of
the highest Human Development Index of continental Sub-Saharan Africa.
Botswana is a member of the African Union, the Southern African Development
Community, the Commonwealth of Nations, and the United Nations. The country
has been among the hardest hit by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Despite the success
in programmes to make treatments available to those infected, and to educate
the populace in general about how to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS, the number
of people with AIDS rose from 290,000 in 2005 to 320,000 in 2013. As of
2014, Botswana has the third-highest prevalence rate for HIV/AIDS, with
roughly 20% of the population infected.
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