THE PARADISE ISLAND OF MAURITIUS

HISTORY
Claimed by the Dutch in the year 1598 and occupied by the French between 1715 to 1810, Mauritius was ruled by the Great Britain from 1814 after the treaty of Paris. The island gained independence from the British colony on the 12th March 1968 and was a constitutional monarchy with Queen Elizabeth ll as the head of state. Mauritius Island became a republic island on March 12, 1992 with a democratic government based on the west minister Model.

The head of state of Mauritius is the president who is elected by the national assembly and Mauritian parliament. The government is headed by the Prime Minister and a council of ministers.
Situated in the northwest, Port Louis is the largest city and the capital of the island.
The Mauritian economy is based mainly on four sectors: Tourism, Textiles, sugar and services.

LOCATION 
Situated in the Indian Ocean, the island is located approximately 1100 Km away from the east coast of Madagascar and 2000 Km to the south eastern coast of Africa with a covered area of 1865 square kms and a coastline of 300 kms in approximate length.

LANGUAGE
Due to its multicultural diversity, Mauritius has a number of spoken languages. The majority of the population is bilingual, fluent in both English and French. Creole and French are the main languages used generally. Various other oriental languages are spoken too including Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, Telegu, Bhojpuri, Guajarati, Marathi, Mandarin and Cantonese.

CULTURE
Diverse ethnic groups make up the population of Mauritius. Immigrants originally from Africa, India, France, England and china brought along their cultures , languages, values and tradition when they settled on the island. The various ethnics live alongside one another making Mauritius a harmonious multicultural nation.

CLIMATE
The island is blessed with a tropical climate. Summer is from November to May, during this period the temperature varies between 22˚C and 35˚C. Winter is from May to November with a temperature variance between 17˚C and 26˚C. The central plateau regions are cooler during these periods.

TIME DIFFERENCE
Mauritius is 4 hours ahead of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)

CURRENCY
The local currency is the Mauritian Rupee (Rs), further divided in 100 cents (cs). Al the banks, major hotels and bureau de change provides facilities to exchange foreign currency. The exchange rate varies from day to day.
Here is an indicative value of the common currencies as at September 2008
1 EURO = Rs 39.95
1 USD     =Rs 28.25
1 POUND=Rs 50.54
1 SA Rand=Rs 03.46