São Vicente (Portuguese for "Saint Vincent") is one of the Barlavento Islands, the northern group within the Cape Verde archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, off the West African coast. It is located between the islands of Santo Antão and Santa Luzia, with the Canal de São Vicente separating it from Santo Antão.
Geography
The island is roughly rectangular in shape with an area of . From east to west it measures and from north to south . The island, of volcanic origin, is fairly flat. The last volcanic activity is considered to have taken place in the Pleistocene. Although very eroded, some craters still remain, for instance Viana. Its highest point is Monte Verde, located in the eastern part with an altitude of . Other mountains include Madeiral (680 m), Caixa (535 m) and Monte Cara (490 m).
92.6% of the island population lives in the urban area of Mindelo, on the Porto Grande Bay, a caldera that is breached by the ocean. A small islet, Ilhéu dos Pássaros, is less than one nautical mile off the coast of Porto Grande Bay. There are a few intermittent streams, including Ribeira do Calhau and Ribeira de Julião.
Climate
São Vicente has a hot desert climate (Köppen BWh). The average annual temperature in Mindelo is . The island is very dry with only annual precipitation in Mindelo. Only the higher area of Monte Verde receives more precipitation.
History
São Vicente was discovered by the Portuguese discoverer Diogo Afonso on 22 January 1462 (Saint Vincent's Day). Due to its lack of water, the island was initially used only as a cattle pasture. When the Municipality of Santo Antão was established in 1732, the island of São Vicente was part of it. At that time, it did not have permanent inhabitants. In 1793 the area of Porto Grande Bay was settled. It was only in 1838, when a coal depot was established at Porto Grande Bay to supply ships on Atlantic routes, that the population started to grow rapidly. From the beginning of the 20th century the port of Mindelo lost its importance for transatlantic navigation. Causes for this were the shift from coal to oil as fuel for ships, the rise of competing ports like Dakar and the Canary Islands and the lack of investment in port infrastructure.
Municipality
Administratively, the island of São Vicente is covered by one municipality, Concelho de São Vicente. This municipality consists of one freguesia (civil parish), Nossa Senhora da Luz, which also covers the whole island. The municipal seat is the city of Mindelo.
The freguesia is subdivided into the following settlements:
Baía das Gatas
Lameirão
Mindelo (city) Monte Verde Norte da Baía Ribeira da Vinha Ribeira de Calhau Ribeira Julião Salamansa São Pedro
Politics
Since 2004, the Movement for Democracy (MpD) is the ruling party of the municipality. The results of the latest elections, in 2016:
Presidents
Henrique Teixeira de Sousa, in the 1960s
Onésimo Silveira, in the late-1990s and the early 2000s
Isaura Gomes 2004–2005 and 2008–2011
Augusto Neves (since 2011)
Population
In the 1830s, São Vicente had an estimated population of 356. The population of São Vicente in the 2010 census was 76,140, making it the second most populous island of Cape Verde after Santiago. The annual population growth is 1.3%. 92.6% of the population live in urban areas, which is the highest proportion of all islands (average for Cape Verde: 61.8%). Life expectancy is 76 years, higher than some other parts of the world. The birth rate is 2.7% and infant mortality rate is 18 per 1000 live births (for comparison 103 in DR Congo, 55 in India, 27 in Turkey, 23 in Brazil, 16 in Russia, 4 in Finland).
The majority of the population is young; 49% of the population is under the age of 25, and 7.4% of the population is over the age of 65. The island has 19,923 households, of which there are an average of 3.8 persons per household, lower than Cape Verde's level of 4.2 persons per household. In 2010 15.1% of the households owned an automobile (Cape Verde: 12.7%).
Economy
The economy of the island was always based almost exclusively on commerce and services. Due to lack of rain, agriculture is at a subsistence level. Fishing has some relevance, but conditions prevent it from being more important, not only for the catch—lobster—but also for the associated industries: conserves, drying and salting of fish, and naval construction.