The southernmost country on the African continent, South Africa has a diverse and dramatic landscape. Bordered on the east and south by the Indian Ocean and on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, some 1,725 miles (2760 km) of coastline are nearly unbroken by bays or coves. The country's only one good natural harbor is at Saldanha Bay in the southwest. Lesotho forms an enclave in the northeastern part of the country.

Most of the interior is covered by high plateaus separated from the country's long coastline by chains of spectacular mountains. Rich in gold and diamonds, the country's industrial base grew up around the mining industry. South Africa is the world's largest producer of gold.  Most of South Africa's diamond fields are located in the Kimberley area of Northern Cape; this province also has the largest known manganese deposits in the world.

Land use ranges from cattle grazing in the west to mixed farming (both crops and livestock) in the central areas to acres of corn and other grain in the east. Three scenic rivers - the Orange, Vaal, and Limpopo punctuate the vast countryside, and supply the population and industry with plentiful fresh water.  The fabled Limpopo flows northeastward to the Botswana border, then eastward along the Botswana and Zimbabwe borders until it enters Mozambique, where it empties into the Indian Ocean.

South Africa has a mixed environmental heritage. Its national parks, reserves, and botanical gardens are among the best managed conservation areas in the world, but many ecological problems originated from political and socioeconomic policies associated with the apartheid period that ended in 1994. Overpopulation in the former black homelands (Bantustans) led to intensive settlement, livestock grazing, and fuel-wood cutting on limited areas of land, which in turn led to soil erosion, land degradation, deforestation, and bush encroachment (proliferation of bush vegetation of little value for grazing).