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People
Demography
The population of Comoros numbers around 800,000 in recent years. The majority of the Comoran people live on one of the three large islands, Grande Comore, Anjouan and Moheli. The rate of urbanization in the Comoros is among the highest in the world. In 1980 about 23 percent of the population was urban. By 1985, that number had risen to 25 percent, in 1991 it had risen to 30 percent and in the late 1990s, it has increased to over 32 percent. There is no immediate sign of abatement as the modern economy offers urban jobs while the already small agricultural sector is shrinking.
Culture and Identity
As they share African-Arab origins, Islam is the dominant religion, reinforced by Koranic schools for children. Though the Arab culture is firmly established throughout the Indian Ocean archipelago, a substantial minority of the citizens of Mayotte (the Mahorais) are Catholic and have been strongly influenced by French culture. The distinction between Mayotte and the other islands has been critical to the political formation of Comoros. The people of Mayotte have long held a stronger French identity than the other islands and during the colonial era, under French rule, the people of Mayotte prospered to a greater degree than the other islands.
The most common language spoken in Comoros is Comoran, a Creole derived originally from KiSwahili. There are two dialects of Comoran, Shindzwani (spoken on the island of Anjouan) and Shimaore (spoken on the island of Mayotte). Comoran-Shingazidja, spoken mostly on the Grande Comore Island, is considered a distinct language even though it closely resembles Comoran. The Shimwali dialect of Comoran-Shingazidja is spoken on the island of Moheli. The educated population speaks French and the estimated 700 people of Malagasy extraction living in Comoros speak the Sakalava dialect of Malagasy. More people speak French than anything else in Mayotte. Arabic is common in certain elite circles and as the language of prayer. The distinction between languages and dialects has grown since independence in 1975, as language use has been a fundamental component of the formation of sub-national and national identities in Comoros.
Ethnic distinctions in Comoros have been forming along island-identity lines. Most people are some combination of Arab, French and Bantu-African extraction. Like nearby Madagascar, the years have seen a blending of these distinct influences into a distinctly Comoran people. However, the more recent immigration patterns, the relative isolation of the populations by island, and the relatively loose political union between islands held at various points in history have led to the creation of strong island identities as opposed to more cross-cutting ethnic identities per se. The island identities have become increasingly nationalistic over time.
Social Stratification
After island identities, social class stratification holds the largest social division in Comoros. This distinction is especially apparent in urban areas where the influence of the sultanates was the strongest. The largest class is of "wangawana" (free people) or "wandru wa ntsi" (people of the earth). People in this class are organized in a hierarchical manner by the stature of their family, quartier or village. The higher social classes, people of the palace, are those that are descendants from the dynasties of Arab sultans. The lower social classes are those who descended from servants or slaves to the sultans. In the larger cities of the Grande Comore, fishermen constitute a specialized socio-professional class. They live in distinct quartiers of the cities and are considered inferior to the class of free people. The bulk of the population lives rurally off of subsistence agriculture, animal husbandry or fishing. While most of these people live beyond the pale of the complex urban hierarchy, a higher, rural merchant class does exist in the countryside.
Health and Welfare
According to recent estimates, Comoros has a life expectancy of 63.1 years of age (males: 60.72 years; females: 65.55 years). The infant mortality rate is 68.58 deaths/1,000 live births. Comoros has avoided the HIV/AIDS crisis that has hit many continental African countries. There have been only a handfull of reported cases since 1979 and in recent years was estimated at 0.12 percent. However, the government has taken significant measures to avoid an upturn in this rate by sponsoring HIV/AIDS awareness programs. About 57 percent of the population is literate, according to recent estimates.
Education expenditures in the country amount to7.6 percent of GDP. Health expenditures in this country amount to 3.4 percent of GDP. Availability of drinkable water is reasonably good; access to sanitation facilities is far more of a problem, especially in rural areas.
Human Development
The Comoros is a poor country, but its standard of living is somewhat higher than many African countries. This is reflected in the United Nations Human Development Program's Human Development Index (HDI). The HDI is a composite of several indicators, which measure a country's achievements in three main areas of human development: longevity, knowledge and education, as well as economic standard of living. The HDI from the human development report places Comoros in the low human development category, at 140th place among 169 countries.
Although the concept of human development is complicated and cannot be properly captured by values and indices, the HDI, which is calculated and updated annually, offers a wide-ranging assessment of human development in certain countries, not based solely upon traditional economic and financial indicators.
Written by Dr. Denise Youngblood Coleman, Editor in Chief, www.countrywatch.com; see Bibliography for research sources.
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