Walvis Bay

Walvis Bay, town and anchorage in west-central Namibia, lying along the Atlantic Ocean. It constituted an exclave of South Africa until 1992.

A mid-19th-century rush for guano deposits on a number of adjacent islands was followed by British annexation of the bay and the adjacent hinterland in 1878. It was incorporated into Britain’s Cape Colony (now part of South Africa) in 1884, the same year in which Germany established the colony of South West Africa. By the Act of Union (1910) Walvis Bay was included in the newly united South Africa. For reasons of convenience, it was administered as part of South West Africa from 1922 until 1977. From 1978 it was governed directly by South Africa, which retained the exclave after Namibia reached independence in 1990. The latter disputed South Africa’s possession of Walvis Bay, claiming the exclave was Namibian territory. In 1992 the two countries agreed to administer the exclave jointly, and in 1994 South Africa transferred sovereignty over Walvis Bay to Namibia.

The town of Walvis Bay lies on the edge of the Namib Desert at the mouth of the intermittently flowing Kuiseb River. A portion of the town lies below sea level (4 feet [1.2 meters]) and is protected by a dike against flooding. Walvis Bay Harbour serves as Namibia’s chief port. It is sheltered by Pelican Point Peninsula on the northwest and is connected to the interior by road, rail, and air. The harbor was formerly a deepwater anchorage for the South African navy, and since the late 1970s the port has exported uranium from one of the world’s most important deposits, at Rössing, 50 miles (80 km) northeast. Severe coastal overfishing from the mid-1970s caused a decline in importance of the town’s former economic mainstay. Pop. (2001) 43,611; (2023) 102,704.