ANTIGUA & BARBUDA

ANTIGUA & BARBUDA consists of three islands . Antigua is far and away the most important , being the largest and where an estimated 98 per cent of the population live . The remainder inhabit Barbuda , a low-lying coral island , while a tiny third island lies unhabited. Unlike most of the other members of the Leeward Islands group , Antigua has no forests , few trees and no rivers . With only a few springs , droughts occur even though approximately 1000 mm of rain falls every year . Few native animals exist but the islands are home to over 100 species of birds. After the closure of the sugar farming industry in the 1970's , the islands have come to depend on their beaches to lure tourists and on development a finance and banking industry . Two military bases on Antigua have been leased to the USA . Ninety per cent of Antigua & Barbuda population are the descendants of black slaves brought to the islands . The population has recently has been increased by some 3000 refugees fleeing a volcanic eruption on nearby Montserrat.

Antigua has a population of 82,000, comprised chiefly of a mixture of people of West African, British and Portuguese descent. The islands of Antigua and Barbuda are part of the Lesser Antilles archipelago. To the south of Antigua and Barbuda lie the islands of Guadeloupe, Dominica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Barbados, Grenada and Trinidad and Tobago. Montserrat lies to the southwest; Saint Kitts and Nevis and Saint Eustatius are to the west, and Saint Barthélemy, Saint Martin and Anguilla are to the northwest.

St. John's Cathedral

Cricket ground in St. John, Antigua.