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- lake on the northeastern boundary of Nigeria.
- It once varied in extent between rainy and
- dry seasons from 50,000 sq km, 20,000 sq mi to
- 20,000 sq km, 7,000 sq mi, but a series of
- droughts 1979-89 reduced its area by 80%. The
- S Chad irrigation project used the lake
- waters to irrigate the surrounding desert,
- but the 4,000 km, 2,500 mi of canals dug for
- the project are now permanently dry because
- of the shrinking size of the lake. The Lake
- Chad basin is being jointly developed for oil
- and natron by Cameroon, Chad, Niger, and
- Nigeria.
- The lake was first seen by European explorers
- 1823.
-