Guinea

This west African country was a French colony until it gained independence in 1958. With a population of 10.2 million (July 2005 estimate), it has a female life expectancy of 50.7 years. The country's birth rate is 41.8 per 1,000, with an infant mortality rate of 90 per 1,000 live births.

Traditional rural lifestyles have changed little since the arrival of the French, with many of the population still living in small villages. The area received worldwide attention in Camara Laye's book L'Enfant Noir (1954), translated into English in the following year. It describes the life of a boy growing up in a village, his jeweler father having been a blacksmith, and his mother bringing him up with tribal customs while becoming a mediator in numerous village disputes. Although Guinea was a colony at the time, the book shows that French culture had no significant influence on village life, although as a boy Laye did attend French elementary and secondary schools. During the French colonial period, a hospital was built in Conakry, the country's capital, but little other change occurred in towns and villages throughout the country.

Although the country has extensive natural resources, Guinea has never prospered; some attribute this to the socialist policies of Sekou Touré, who ran the country for the first 26 years after independence. He was eager to hold a different political stance than France, and this resulted in many companies choosing not to invest in Guinea, and in turn the economy of the country never grew as much as other countries in the region.