Jordan

Jordan Officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is an Arab country in Western Asia, on the East Bank of the Jordan River. Jordan is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south and the east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and Israel and the Palestinian West Bank to the west. The Dead Sea is located along its western borders and the country has a 26-kilometer coastline on the Red Sea in its extreme south-west. Jordan is strategically located at the crossroads of Asia, Africa and Europe. The capital, Amman, is Jordan’s most populous city as well as the country’s economic, political and cultural center.

 

Jordan Population 2020

8,784,657	Current population
4,516,676	Current male population (51.4%)
4,267,981	Current female population (48.6%)

 

Agriculture
Agriculture in Jordan contributed substantially to the economy at the time of Jordan’s independence, but it subsequently suffered a decades-long steady decline. In the early 1950s, agriculture constituted almost 40 percent of GNP; on the eve of the June 1967 War, it was 17 percent (including produce from the West Bank, which was under Jordan’s mandate at the time).

By the mid-1980s, agriculture’s share of GNP in Jordan was only about 6 percent. In contrast, in Syria and Egypt agriculture constituted more than 20 percent of GNP in the 1980s. Several factors contributed to this downward trend. With the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Jordan lost prime farmland that Jordan had been running since 1949. Starting in the mid-1970s, Jordanian labor emigration also hastened the decline of agriculture. Many Jordanian abandoned the land to take more lucrative jobs abroad. Others migrated to cities where labor shortages had led to higher wages for manual workers. Deserted farms were built over as urban areas expanded. As the Jordanian government drove up interest rates to attract remittance income, farm credit tightened, which made it difficult for farmers to buy seed and fertilizer.

Livestock
Livestock production was limited in the late 1980s. Jordan had about 35,000 head of cattle but more than 1 million sheep and 500,000 goats, and the government planned to increase their numbers. In the late 1980s, the annual production of red meat ranged between 10,000 and 15,000 metric tons, less than 33 percent of domestic consumption. A major impediment to increased livestock production was the high cost of imported feed. Jordan imported cereals at a high cost for human consumption, but the imported animal feed was a much lower priority. Likewise, the arid, rain-fed land that could have been used for grazing or for fodder production was set aside for wheat production. Jordan was self-sufficient, however, in poultry meat production (about 35,000 metric tons) and egg production (about 400,000 eggs), and exported these products to neighboring countries.

Plants and Animals
The wildlife of Jordan includes its flora and fauna and their natural habitats. Although much of the country is desert, it has several geographic regions, each with a diversity of plants and animals adapted to their own particular habitats. Fossil finds show that in Paleolithic times, the region had Syrian brown bears, Asiatic lions, zebras, Asian elephants, and rhinoceroses, but these species are all now extinct in this region.

• Flora
  Jordan has a range of biodiverse habitats and over two thousand species of plants have been recorded in the country; this includes about 150 plant families and 700 genera. Just three of these are gymnosperms; Aleppo pine, Mediterranean cypress and Phoenecian juniper. Somewhere between five and ten species of ferns have been recorded, as well as about 150 species of fungi and lichen.
  Many of the flowering plants bloom in the spring after the winter rains and the type of vegetation depends largely on the amount of precipitation. The mountainous regions in the northwest are clothed in natural forests of pine, deciduous oak, evergreen oak, pistachio, and wild olive. Further south and east, the vegetation becomes scrubbier and merges into steppe-type vegetation, and the center and east of the country are largely hamada, a hard desert plateau with little sand.
  The slopes overlooking the rift valley are seared with wadis which run with water in the winter and support a lush growth of trees and bushes in otherwise inhospitable terrain. In the rift valley, the Fifa Nature Reserve includes saltpans and areas of semi-tropical vegetation. Further south is the Qatar Nature Reserve, close to the Gulf of Aqaba, and this area is dry throughout the year and contains steppe-type vegetation with Acacia trees.
  In the scrubby area the main woody species is Sarcopoterium spinosum and the steppe area is dominated by Ballota undulata and Salvia Dominica, with Astragalus bethlemiticus and Marrubium libanoticum. The hamada region has a limited number of species. Stony areas are often dominated by Anabasis spp. while sandier areas have more Retama raetam. In wadi areas, gravelly washes or places subject to flash floods, there is a more diverse flora which includes Tamarix, Artemisia, and Acacia, and pebbly areas typically have Salsola verticillata and Halogeton alopecuroides. The national flower of Jordan is the black iris (Iris nigricans) which can be found growing near Madaba.

• Fauna
  Hunting is a traditional sport in Jordan, and in the 1930s, the Arabian oryx was hunted to extinction in the country. Three species of gazelle, the Dorcas, goitered and mountain gazelles, were also hunted and greatly reduced in numbers. In 1973, legislation was enacted to control hunting, with a closed season being introduced and quotas being set. The Shaumari Wildlife Reserve, a fenced-off area in the deserts of central Jordan, has since been used in a breeding and reintroduction program for the Arabian oryx, as well as other species such as the Somali ostrich, the Persian longer, and gazelles. Other animals that have been released into the wild are the Nubian ibex, wild boar, fallow deer, and roe deer.
  Carnivorous mammals in Jordan include the striped hyena, caracal, jungle cat, sand cat, African wildcat, Arabian wolf, golden jackal, fennec fox, Arabian red fox, Blanford’s fox, Rüppell’s fox, Egyptian mongoose, least weasel, European badger, honey badger, and European otter. There are about twenty species of bat and a similar number of rodents including the Caucasian squirrel, Asian garden dormouse, Euphrates jerboa, Middle East blind mole-rat, and various voles, birds, mice, rats, spiny mice, gerbils, and hamsters. Other mammals found in suitable habitat are the wild boar, European hare, mountain hare, Indian crested porcupine, rock hyrax, European hedgehog, long-eared hedgehog and desert hedgehog.
  Approximately 426 species of birds have been recorded in Jordan. Many of these are rare or accidental arrivals, and others are migratory birds in a passage between their breeding grounds and their wintering quarters. Others overwinter in Jordan and still, others breed in the country. Some of them are globally threatened, and these include the white-headed duck, Atlantic petrel, northern bald ibis, Egyptian vulture, Griffon vulture, lappet-faced vulture, Pharaoh eagle-owl, barn owl, golden eagle, steppe eagle, greater spotted eagle, eastern imperial eagle, MacQueen’s bustard, Siberian crane, sociable lapwing, saker falcon, marbled duck, aquatic warbler and Syrian serin. Four large raptors, the short-toed snake eagle, long-legged buzzard, Barbary falcon and Bonelli’s eagle, are found in the Mujib Biosphere Reserve, and the globally threatened lesser kestrel breeds there. Other bird species prevalent in Jordan include the hooded crow, Eurasian jay, hoopoe, common cuckoo, Tristram’s starling, house crow and white-spectacled bulbul.
  Five species of turtle are known from Jordan and there are a variety of snakes, mostly colubrids and vipers, but with representatives of seven snake families. Other reptiles include geckos, skinks, agamid lizards, wall lizards, the desert monitor and the glass snake (a legless lizard). Amphibians are limited to a single species of newt, the southern banded newt, and four species of frogs and toads.
  The number of freshwater fish species is limited but there are 25 species of native and introduced fish in eight families in the Jordan River and various lakes and dams. The Jordan bream is a species of fish endemic to the rivers and lakes of the Jordan River basin. It has been introduced to several lakes and reservoirs in the region including the Azraq Wetland Reserve, although this oasis in the eastern desert is drying up because excessive quantities of groundwater are being extracted. The critically endangered Azraq tooth carp is also hanging on to existence in this single location, with a population consisting of an estimated few thousand individuals.

 

Climate and Water Resources
Most of Jordan’s territory is classified as desert. Summers are generally hot and dry, while winters can be cold in some areas. The annual rainfall varies from little more than 30 mm in desert areas up to 572 mm in the hilly northwest of Jordan. Almost all precipitation falls between October and May. In the Jordan Valley, winters are mild and summer very hot, with very little rainfall throughout the year.

According to its Water Strategy, Jordan is one of the four driest countries in the world. Due to rapid population growth, water availability per capita has declined significantly, from 3,600 m³ per capita and year in 1946 to only 145 m³ in 2008. Water demand distinctly exceeds supply. Almost two thirds (64%) of the water is supplied for irrigation, while municipal use accounts for 30%, industry for 5% and tourism for 1%. In order to overcome the water crisis, the Jordanian Water Strategy focuses on demand management and an increase in water supply through the utilization of treated wastewater, the exploitation of the non-renewable Disi aquifer and a canal from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea.

 

Jordan Delegate

Dr. Mahmoud Alhanatleh
Secretary-General of the WOAH Regional Commission for the Middle East
CVO Director of Veterinary Directorate
Ministry of Agriculture
Queen Rania Al Abdullah Street 39
Amman
JORDAN