Berbera
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Berbera (Template:Respell; Template:Langx, Template:Langx) is the capital of the Sahil region of Somaliland and is the main sea port of the country, located approximately 160 km from the national capital, Hargeisa.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite news</ref> Berbera is a coastal city and was the former capital of the British Somaliland protectorate before Hargeisa. It also served as a major port of the Ifat, Adal and Isaaq sultanates from the 13th to 19th centuries.<ref name="Tukpmorttsep">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":1">Template:Cite book</ref>
In antiquity, Berbera was part of a chain of commercial port cities along the Somali seaboard. During the early modern period, Berbera was the most important place of trade in the Somali Peninsula.<ref name="Sherwood, Gilbert & Piper">Template:Cite book</ref> It later served as the capital of the British Somaliland protectorate from 1884 to 1941, when it was replaced by Hargeisa. In 1960, the British Somaliland protectorate gained independence as the State of Somaliland and united five days later with the Trust Territory of Somalia (the former Italian Somalia) to form the Somali Republic.<ref name="Wssom1">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Encyclopædia Britannica 2002 p.835">Encyclopædia Britannica, The New Encyclopædia Britannica, (Encyclopædia Britannica: 2002), p.835</ref> Located strategically on the oil route, the city has a deep seaport, which serves as the region's main commercial harbour.
Etymology
The name Berbera comes from the Somali phrase beri-beri, meaning occasionally. Before it became a major port city, Berbera was a seasonal settlement, only inhabited during cooler months.<ref name=":2">Template:Cite book</ref> Residents still head for milder weather in the summer, a vacation tradition called xagaa-bax, which is also common in other coastal cities (e.g. Djibouti, Bosaso).<ref name=":2" />
According to the Royal Asiatic Society, the name could be derived from the Arabic word barbarah, meaning "talking much, shouting".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
History
Antiquity
Template:Main Berbera was part of the classical Somali city-states that engaged in a lucrative trade network connecting Somali merchants with Phoenicia, Ptolemic Egypt, Ancient Greece, Parthian Persia, Saba, Nabataea and the Roman Empire. Somali sailors used the ancient Somali maritime vessel known as the beden to transport their cargo.<ref name="ReferenceA">Journal of African History pg.50 by John Donnelly Fage and Roland Anthony Oliver</ref>
Berbera preserves the ancient name of the coast along the southern shore of the Gulf of Aden. It is believed to be the ancient port of Malao (Template:Langx) described as 800 stadia beyond the city of the Avalites, described in the eighth chapter of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, which was written by a Greek merchant in the first century AD. In the Periplus it is described as: <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />
"After Avalites there is another market-town, better than this, called Malao, distant a sail of about eight hundred stadia. The anchorage is an open roadstead, sheltered by a spit running out from the east. Here the natives are more peaceable. There are imported into this place the things already mentioned, and many tunics, cloaks from Arsinoe, dressed and dyed; drinking-cups, sheets of soft copper in small quantity, iron, and gold and silver coin, but not much. There are exported from these places myrrh, a little frankincense, (that known as far-side), the harder cinnamon, duaca, Indian copal and macir, which are imported into Arabia; and slaves, but rarely."{{#if:|
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Middle Ages
Duan Chengshi, a Chinese Tang dynasty scholar, described in his written work of AD 863 the slave trade, ivory trade, and ambergris trade of Bobali, which is thought to be Berbera. The great city was also later mentioned by the Islamic traveller Ibn Sa'id as well as Ibn Battuta in the thirteenth century.<ref>I.M. Lewis, "The Somali Conquest of the Horn of Africa", Journal of African History, 1 (1960), p. 217</ref>
In Abu'l-Fida's, A Sketch of the Countries (Template:Langx), the present-day Gulf of Aden was called the Gulf of Berbera, which shows how important Berbera was in both regional and international trade during the medieval period.<ref>Identifiants et Référentiels Sudoc Pour L'Enseignement Supérieur et la Recherche - Abū al-Fidā (1273-1331) Template:In lang</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
The Book of Curiosities uniquely depicts the Indian Ocean as an enclosed narrow sea, per Ptolemaic tradition, drawn in two halves; eastern (India and China) and western (East Africa) later joined elliptically. In the surviving copy, the halves are misplaced, linking China to Arabia and Africa to India. The Somali section, rich in original detail, names Berbera’s coast, and several mountains are marked, including the Cape of Guardafui at the tip of the Horn of Africa.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Maydh, Heis, and other capes are also visualized.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Legendary Arab explorer Ahmad ibn Mājid wrote of Berbera and a few other notable landmarks and ports of the northern Somali coast and referred to what is now the Gulf of Aden as the Gulf of Berbera. He also included Zeila and its archipelago, Siyara, Heis, Alula, Ruguda, Maydh, El-Sheikh and El-Darad.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Berbera was an important and well built settlement that served as a major harbor port for several successive Somali Kingdoms in the Middle Ages like the early Adal Kingdom, Ifat Sultanate and Adal Sultanate.<ref>I.M. Lewis, A Modern History of the Somali, fourth edition (Oxford: James Currey, 2002), p. 21</ref>
Berbera, along with Zeila, were the two most important ports situated inside the Adal Sultanate, and they provided vital political and commercial links with the wider Islamic World:
Along with other ports and settlements in East Africa, explorers Ludovico di Varthema, Duarte Barbosa and Leo Africanus wrote brief accounts of the port town of Berbera in the early sixteenth century, mainly detailing her historic trading links with Aden and Khambat (Cambay).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Duarte Barbosa's brief account of Berbera:
Further on, on the same coast, is a town of the Moors [Muslims] called Barbara; it has a port, at which many ships of Adeni and Cambay touch with their merchandise, and from there those of Cambay carry away much gold, and ivory, and other things, and those of Aden take many provisions, meat, honey, and wax, because, as they say, it is a very abundant country.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Not long after their departure from Zeila and Berbera, the Portuguese fleet under Lopo Soares de Albergaria and António de Saldanha sacked both port towns between 1516 and 1518.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
According to Selman Reis, an ambitious Ottoman Red Sea admiral, Berbera was rich with pearls, and the amount of merchandise and trade consisting of "gold, musk and ivory" present at Berbera, on the Somali coast, was described by Selman as "limitless".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Precolonialism
One of the earliest precolonial accounts comes from Ibrahim Punkar, who wrote a memoir in 1801 and letter in 1809 to the Governor of Bombay John Duncan. Noting that Berbera had 5-6 towers with armed guards, he would go to describe the trade and general outlook of the city. Further noting the Somali inhabitants adhering to the Shafi'i school of Sunni Islam significant trade came from Harar in the interior alongside Gondar and Shewa. Cloth, rice and tobacco came from Kutch in Gujarat and Muscat with Mocha, Jeddah and Al Mukalla being the source of dates and tin. Punkar stated that the Somalis of the area were skilled musketeers and possessed powerful cavalry and knowledge of archery, but were often internally divided except for when united against common enemies. All foreigners including Arabs and Indians who often frequented Berbera were prohibited from venturing further inland, lest they access the lucrative trade of Harar directly and bypass the Somalis.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
One certainty about Berbera over the following centuries was that it was the site of an annual fair, held between October and April, which Mordechai Abir describes as "among the most important commercial events of the east coast of Africa."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The major Somali sub-clans of the Isaaq in Somaliland, caravans from Harar and the interior, and Banyan merchants from Porbandar, Mangalore and Mumbai gathered to trade. All of this was kept secret from European merchants.<ref>Abir, Era of the Princes, p. 17</ref> Lieutenant C. J. Cruttenden, who wrote a memoir describing this portion of the Somali coast dated 12 May 1848, provided an account of the Berbera fair and an account of the historic environs of the town: "an aqueduct of stone and chunam, some nine miles [15 km] in length", which had once emptied into a presently dry reservoir adjacent to the ruins of a mosque. He explored part of its course from the reservoir past a number of tombs built of stones taken from the aqueduct to reach a spring, above which lay "the remains of a small fort or tower of chunam and stone ... on the hill-side immediately over the spring." Cruttenden noted that in "style it was different to any houses now found on the Somali coast", and concluded with noting the presence in "the neighbourhood of the fort above mentioned [an] abundance of broken glass and pottery ... from which I infer that it was a place of considerable antiquity; but, though diligent search was made, no traces of inscriptions could be discovered."<ref>C. J. Cruttenden, "Memoir on the Western or Edoor Tribes, Inhabiting the Somali Coast of N.-E. Africa, with the Southern Branches of the Family of Darrood, Resident on the Banks of the Webbe Shebeyli, Commonly Called the River Webbe," Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, 19 (1849), pp. 54, 56</ref>
Berbera was the most important port in the Somali Peninsula between the 18th–19th centuries. For centuries, Berbera had extensive trade relations with several historic ports in Arabia and the Indian subcontinent. Additionally, the Somali and Ethiopian interiors were very dependent on Berbera for trade, where most of the goods for export arrived from.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> During the 1833 trading season, the port town swelled up to 70,000 people, and upwards of 6,000 camels laden with goods arrived from the interior within a single day. Berbera was the main marketplace in the entire Somali seaboard for various goods procured from the interior, such as livestock, coffee, frankincense, myrrh, acacia gum, saffron, feathers, wax, ghee, hide (skin), gold and ivory.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In the trading season of 1840, French explorer Charles-Xavier Rochet d'Héricourt visited Berbera and estimated the total exports of the season to be around thirteen times greater than that of Massawa.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
According to a trade journal published in 1856, Berbera was described as “the freest port in the world, and the most important trading place on the whole Arabian Gulf.”:
“The only seaports of importance on this coast are Feyla [Zeila] and Berbera; the former is an Arabian colony, dependent of Mocha, but Berbera is independent of any foreign power. It is, without having the name, the freest port in the world, and the most important trading place on the whole Arabian Gulf. From the beginning of November to the end of April, a large fair assembles in Berbera, and caravans of 6,000 camels at a time come from the interior loaded with coffee, (considered superior to Mocha in Bombay), gum, ivory, hides, skins, grain, cattle, and sour milk, the substitute of fermented drinks in these regions; also much cattle is brought there for the Aden market.”<ref name="The Merchants' Magazine and Commercial Review">Template:Cite book</ref>
Historically, the port of Berbera was controlled indigenously between the mercantile Reer Ahmed Nur (Ayyal Ahmed) and Reer Yunis Nuh (Ayyal Yunis) sub-clans of the Sa'ad Musa, Habr Awal. These two sub-clans effectively administered the trade of the town, especially in the dealings of all transactions and brokerage between various parties to issuing protection agreements towards the foreign Arab and Indian traders. In the year 1845, the two sub-clans had a dissension over the control of the trade of Berbera, which lead to a wider altercation where each side sought outside support.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> With the backing of Haji Sharmarke Ali Saleh, the Reer Ahmed Nuh drove out their kinsmen and declared themselves the sole commercial masters of Berbera.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The defeated Reer Yunis Nuh moved westwards and established the port of Bulhar which later, for a brief period, became a trading rival to nearby Berbera.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Sharmarke Ali Saleh's actions were a political ruse to control Berbera for himself, which he achieved for several years.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Berbera commanded most of the trade traffic with the Somali and Ethiopian interiors. The two main caravan trade routes from Berbera extended to Harar and Shewa in the west, and to the Shebelle basin in the south (although some caravans traveled to/from as far as the Jubba River).<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Moreover, the inland caravan trade routes were also concurrently used as pilgrim routes during the trading season by Somali Hajj pilgrims who resided in the deep interior.<ref>Christie (M.D.), Cholera Epidemics, p. 145</ref>
In addition, Mocha, Aden, Jeddah and several other ports in Arabia had constant contact with Berbera in regard to general trade and commerce.<ref>Pankhurst, Journal of Ethiopian Studies, p. 44</ref> In the early years of the nineteenth century, the local Somalis of Berbera (Habr Awal clan) had a navigation act where they excluded Arab vessels and brought the goods and produce of the interior in their own ships to the Arabian ports:
Berbera held an annual fair during the cool rain-free months between October and April. This long drawn out market handled immense quantities of coffee, gum Arabic, myrrh and other commodities. These goods in the early nineteenth century were almost exclusively handled by Somalis who, Salt says, had "a kind of navigation act by which they exclude the Arab vessels from their ports and bring the produce of their country either to Aden or Mocha in their own dows."<ref>Pankhurst, Journal of Ethiopian Studies, p.45</ref>
In much of the 19th century, the trade between Berbera and Aden was so important to the later that when disturbances effected the Berbera trading season, Aden too suffered as a result. According to Captain Haines, who was then the colonial administrator of Aden (1839-1854), 80% of Aden's revenue in 1848 was derived from duties charged on imported goods from Berbera. Additionally, most of the coffee imported by Mocha (centre of the coffee trade in early modern times) arrived via Somali merchants from Berbera, who procured the coffee beans from the environs of Harar.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Although the coffee beans were grown in Harar (present-day Ethiopia), the coffee was named Berbera Coffee in the international market, and the beans were considered superior to the locally grown varieties in Yemen.<ref name="The Merchants' Magazine and Commercial Review"/>
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The British explorer Richard Burton made two visits to this port, and his second visit was marred by an attack on his camp by a group of local Somali warriors, and although Burton was able to escape to Aden, one of his companions was killed.<ref>Lewis, A Modern History, p. 36</ref> Burton, recognizing the importance of the port city wrote:
<templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />
In the first place, Berberah is the true key of the Red Sea, the centre of East African traffic, and the only safe place for shipping upon the western Erythraean shore, from Suez to Guardafui. Backed by lands capable of cultivation, and by hills covered with pine and other valuable trees, enjoying a comparatively temperate climate, with a regular although thin monsoon, this harbour has been coveted by many a foreign conqueror. Circumstances have thrown it as it were into our arms, and, if we refuse the chance, another and a rival nation will not be so blind.<ref>Richard Burton, First Footsteps in East Africa, Preface</ref>{{#if:|
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By 1869, a sub-clan of the Reer Ahmed Nur (Ayyal Ahmed, Habr Awal) were operating a fort in the port town and it was manned by several hired guards armed with muskets and fiercely loyal to them. A British officer visiting the city from Aden noted the guards would not betray the Reer Ahmed Nur save death.<ref>Precis of Papers Regarding Aden, 1838-1872, India. Foreign and Political Department, pg. 165-165</ref>
Battle
Template:Main When a British vessel named the Mary Anne attempted to dock in Berbera's port in 1825 it was attacked and multiple members of the crew were massacred by the Habr Awal. In response the Royal Navy enforced a blockade and some accounts narrate a bombardment of the city.<ref name="Laitin 1977 70">Template:Cite book</ref> In 1827 two years later the British arrived and extended an offer to relieve the blockade which had halted Berbera's lucrative trade in exchange for indemnity. Following this offer the Battle of Berbera 1827 broke out. After the Habr Awal defeat, 15,000 Spanish dollars was to be paid by the Habr Awal leaders for the destruction of the ship and loss of life.<ref name="Laitin 1977 70"/>
In the 1830s, the Isaaq Sultan Farah Guled and Haji Ali penned a letter to Sultan bin Saqr Al Qasimi of Ras Al Khaimah requesting military assistance and joint religious war against the British.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> This would not materialize as Sultan Saqr was incapacitated by prior Persian Gulf campaign of 1819 and was unable to send aid to Berbera. Alongside their stronghold in the Persian Gulf & Gulf of Oman the Qasimi were very active both militarily and economically in the Gulf of Aden and were given to plunder and attack ships as far west as the Mocha on the Red Sea.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> They had numerous commercial ties with the Somalis, leading vessels from Ras Al Khaimah and the Persian Gulf to regularly attend trade fairs in the large ports of Berbera and Zeila and were very familiar with the Isaaq.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
British Somaliland
After signing successive treaties with the various clans of the northern Somali coast between 1884 and 1886, the British established a protectorate in the region referred to as British Somaliland.<ref>Hugh Chisholm (ed.), The encyclopædia britannica: a dictionary of arts, sciences, literature and general information, Volume 25, (At the University press: 1911), p.383.</ref> The British garrisoned the protectorate from Aden and administered it from their British India colony until 1898. British Somaliland was then administered by the Foreign Office until 1905 and afterwards by the Colonial Office.
Despite Berbera's strategic location, being the only port with a sheltered harbor on the southern side of the Gulf of Aden (the gateway to the Suez Canal), the British later came to regret their nominal control of the region. In fact, Winston Churchill once visited Berbera in 1907 when he was Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies, and he noted the protectorate be abandoned, since it was "unproductive, inhospitable, and the people are very hostile to occupation."<ref>Samatar, Abdi Ismail The state and rural transformation in Northern Somalia, 1884–1986, Madison: 1989, University of Wisconsin Press, p. 31</ref> The stated purposes of the establishment of the protectorate were to "secure a supply market and to exclude the interference of foreign powers."<ref>Samatar p. 31</ref> The British principally viewed the protectorate as a source for supplies of meat for their British Indian outpost in Aden through the maintenance of order in the coastal areas and protection of the caravan routes from the interior.<ref>Samatar, p. 32</ref><ref>Samatar, Unhappy masses and the challenge of political Islam in the Horn of Africa, Somalia Online [1] retrieved 10-03-27</ref> Colonial administration during this period did not extend infrastructure beyond the coast (which left the Somali clans within the protectorate with greater autonomy),<ref>Samatar, The state and rural transformation in Northern Somalia, p. 42</ref> and contrasted with the more interventionist colonial experience of Italian Somalia.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In the early days of the protectorate, some planned to invest in major infrastructure projects such as the abandoned Berbera-Harar Railway initiative; this was vetoed by parliament because it would harm the cordial agreement (entente cordiale) between France and Britain.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>The Navy Everywhere, 1919. p. 244</ref>
In August 1940, during the East African Campaign, British Somaliland was briefly occupied by Italy after a large invasion force defeated British colonial troops at the Battle of Tug Argan. During this period, the British rounded up soldiers and governmental officials to evacuate them from the territory through Berbera. In total, 7,000 people, including civilians, were evacuated.<ref name="Playfair178">Playfair (1954), p. 178</ref> The Somalis serving in the Somaliland Camel Corps were given the choice of evacuation or disbandment; the majority chose to remain and were allowed to retain their arms.<ref name="Wavell2724">Wavell, p. 2724</ref> In March 1941, the British forces recaptured the protectorate during Operation Appearance after a six-month occupation. The first WW2 Australian POWs were taken hostage here in 1940.
The British Somaliland protectorate gained its independence on 26 June 1960 as the State of Somaliland,<ref name="nytimes6">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="autogenerated1">Template:Cite news</ref> before uniting as planned five days later with the Trust Territory of Somalia (the former Italian Somalia) to form the Somali Republic.<ref name="Encyclopædia Britannica 2002 p.835"/><ref name="nytimes6"/>
Modernity
In the post-independence period, Berbera was administered as the part of the North-Western province of the Somali Republic. It served as the main livestock port of the republic and in the 1970s and 1980s, nearly all of the livestock exports went out through the port of Berbera via Isaaq livestock traders. The entire livestock exports accounted to upwards of 90% of the Somali Republic's entire export figures in a given year, and Berbera's exports alone provided over 75% of the nation's recorded foreign currency income at the time.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The main consumers were the wealthy gulf states and Saudi Arabia in particular.
As early as 1962, The Soviet Union agreed to assist the nascent Somali Republic towards the construction of modern port facilities and a military base, which was completed in 1969 and was called on by sixteen Soviet Ships in 1971.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Coinciding with the Ogaden War between The Somali Republic and Ethiopia in 1977, the Soviets left Berbera and the nation as a whole due to a disagreement, leaving the United States to arrive with a $40 million investment and new health facilities in 1980. By 1985, the city had an estimated population of 70,000, with the outbreak of the Somali National Movement (SNM) ousted government troops from the city following aerial bombardments and extrajudicial killings inflicted on the population by the government. With the downfall of General Siad Barre in 1991, the Northern region of the Somali Republic, declared the state of Somaliland, of Somalia. A slow process of infrastructural reconstruction subsequently began in Berbera and other towns in the region.<ref>Cities of the Middle East and North Africa: A Historical Encyclopedia edited by Michael Dumper, Bruce E. Stanley Page 93</ref>
The city remains a competitive regional port and in 2016 a US$442 million agreement was reached between DP World and the government of Somaliland.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The deal involves enhancing and operating the regional trade and logistics hub at the Port of Berbera.<ref name="Abaltiisbp">Template:Cite news</ref> The project, which will be phased in, will also involve the setting up of a free zone.
On 1 March 2018, Ethiopia became a major shareholder following an agreement with DP World and the Somaliland Port Authority. DP World holds a 51% stake in the project, Somaliland 30% and Ethiopia the remaining 19%. As part of the agreement, the government of Ethiopia will invest in infrastructure to develop the Berbera Corridor as a trade gateway for the inland country, which is one of the fastest growing countries in the world. There are also plans to construct an additional berth at the Port of Berbera, in line with the Berbera master plan, which DP World has started implementing, while adding new equipment to further improve efficiencies and productivity of the port.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":0" />
On 24 June 2021, The CEO of DP World officially announced the second phase of the Berbera port upgrade during the inauguration ceremony for the completion of the first phase. The second phase includes extending the new quay from 400 to 1,000 metres, and adding seven more ship-to-shore gantry cranes, bringing the total to ten and enabling the expanded port to handle up to two million TEU containers a year.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The agreement comes as part of a larger government-to-government memorandum of understanding between Government of the United Arab Emirates and the Government of Somaliland to further strengthen their strategic ties.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Somalia's attempts to obstruct and block the deal were frustrated and failed to stop the project from commencing.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>
A rail link to Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, has remained a point of discussion and may materialize.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> On January 1, 2024, it was announced that Ethiopia signed an agreement with Somaliland to utilize Berbera's sea port.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Geography
Location and habitat
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Berbera is located in coastal region of northern Somalia. An old port city, it has the only sheltered harbour on the southern side of the Gulf of Aden. The landscape around town, along with Somaliland's coastal lowlands, is semi-arid land.
Popular local beaches, such as Bathela and Batalale, have earned the city the nickname Beach City.
Climate
Berbera features a hot arid climate (Köppen BWh). It has long, sweltering summers and short, hot winters, as well as very little rainfall. Average high temperatures consistently exceed Template:Convert during nearly four months of summertime (June, July, August and September). Daytime heat on summer nights is high, with average low temperatures of around Template:Convert. During the coolest months of the year, average high temperatures remain above Template:Convert and average low temperatures also surpass Template:Convert. Although rainfall is low, the relative humidity is very high throughout the year and the atmosphere is simultaneously moist. The combination of the desert heat and the excessive moisture make apparent temperatures reach extremely high levels. Annual average rainfall is minimal, with only Template:Convert of precipitation. There are between 5 and 8 rainy days on average annually. Bright sunshine likely occur during about 84% of the total daytime hours and average annual cloudiness is very low.
Demographics
Historically, Berbera was inhabited by the Reer Ahmed Nuh and Yunis Nuh lineages of the Sa'ad Musa, Habr Awal.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
In more recent times, the Issa Musse sub-clan of the Habr Awal have come to make up the majority of the town's inhabitants,<ref>Template:Citation</ref> while the Habr Yunis, primarily belonging to the Musa Abdallah branch<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> as well as the Habr Je'lo also being present.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Education
There are 30 primary schools operating in Berbera city totaling 63,641 students. The broader Berbera district has 49 schools serving 90,310 students.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Economy
A number of products are exported through the Port of Berbera, including livestock, gum arabic, frankincense, and myrrh. Its seaborne trade is chiefly with Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, and Aden in Yemen, Template:Convert to the north.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Additionally, goods from Ethiopia are also exported through the facility.<ref>"Ethiopia, Somaliland envisage exploiting Barbara port"Template:Dead link, Ethiopian News Agency, 29 July 2009 (accessed 1 November 2009)</ref> The seaside boasts watersport tourist activity such as scuba diving, snorkeling, surfing and coral reefs.<ref>Somalia attractions, Berbera Seaside retrieved 29 November 2013</ref>
Transportation
Berbera is the terminus of roads from Hargeisa and Burco. The city has one of Somaliland's major class seaports, the Port of Berbera.<ref name="Icsti">Template:Cite web</ref> It historically served as a naval and missile base for the Somali government. Following an agreement between the Somali Republic and the USSR in 1962, the port's facilities were patronized by the Soviets and was later significantly upgraded in 1969.<ref name="Trafod">Template:Cite book</ref> The Berbera seaport was later expanded for U.S. military use, after the Somali authorities strengthened ties with the American government.<ref name=Ipcwi>Template:Cite book</ref>
For air transportation, the city is served by the Berbera Airport. It has an extensive Template:Convert runway.<ref name=airwaysv14i7>Template:Cite journal</ref>