Transport and infrastructure in Cape Verde

Road traffic

The network of roads and highways has a total length of 1,350 km. For each of the country's 555,988 inhabitants, this corresponds to 2.43 meters. This puts Cape Verde in 164th place in the global ranking. However, the country's size and population density of around 138 inhabitants per km² must also be taken into account. Countries with fewer inhabitants on the same or even larger area naturally achieve quite different values here and have to connect remote areas to the transport network despite a smaller population.

With an average of 134 traffic fatalities per year (2012 - 2019), road traffic in Cape Verde is considered quite dangerous. This corresponds to around 4.3 accident fatalities per 25.2 inhabitants per year. By comparison, this figure is 5.9 in the European Union as a whole and 17.1 worldwide.

In Cape Verde, traffic drives on the right-hand side of the road, i.e. people drive in the right-hand lane and overtake on the left. Oncoming traffic comes toward you on the left side. Here you can also find an overview of all countries with left-hand traffic.

Data sources used

• Global Health Observatory Data Repository (World Health Organization)
• UNCTAD
• Internation Union of Railways (UIC)
• CIA Factbook
• OECD Statistics
• Wikipedia (german)