Great Rift Valley, geographical concept
Lake Nakuru in the Kenya Lake System
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| UNESCO World Heritage Site | |
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| Criteria | vii, ix, x |
| Reference | 1060 |
| Coordinates | 0°06′S 36°06′E / 0.1°S 36.1°ECoordinates: 0°06′S 36°06′E / 0.1°S 36.1°E |
| Inscription | 2011 (444 Session) |
 Location of Great Rift Valley
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The Great Rift Valley is a name given to the continuous geographic trench, approximately 6,000 kilometres (3,700 mi) in length, that runs from Lebanon's Beqaa Valley in Asia to Mozambique in South Eastern Africa. The name continues in some usages, although it is today considered geologically imprecise as it combines features that are today regarded as separate, although related, rift and fault systems.
Today, the term is most often used to refer to the valley of the East African Rift, the divergent plate boundary which extends from the Afar Triple Junction southward across eastern Africa, and is in the process of splitting the African Plate into two new separate plates. Geologists generally refer to these incipient plates as the Nubian Plate and the Somali Plate.
The Great Rift Valley as originally described was thought to extend from Lebanon in the north to Mozambique in the south, where it constitutes one of two distinct physiographic provinces of the East African mountains. It included what we would call today the Lebanese section of the Dead Sea Transform, the Jordan Rift Valley, Red Sea Rift and the East African Rift.
Today these rifts and faults are seen as distinct, although connected. These were only formed 35 million years ago.
The northernmost part of the Rift corresponds to the central section of what is called today the Dead Sea Transform (DST) or Rift. This midsection of the DST forms the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon, separating the Lebanon from the Anti-Lebanon Mountains. Further south it is known as the Hula Valley separating the Galilee mountains and the Golan Heights.
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