Seychelles lies in the western Indian Ocean between approximately 4ºS and 10ºS and 46ºE and 54ºE. The number of islands listed in the Constitution is 155, the majority of which are small and uninhabited. The landmass is only 457 sq km, but the islands are spread over an Exclusive Economic Zone of 1,374,000 sq km. About 90 percent of the population of 82,000 live on Mahé, 9 percent on Praslin and La Digue. Around a third of the land area is the island of Mahé and a further third the atoll of Aldabra.
There are two distinct regions:
THE OUTER ISLANDS
The outer islands west and south of the granitics. These are relatively young coralline islands just a few metres above sea level, although the Aldabra group and St Pierre (Farquhar Group) are unusual, raised coral islands that have emerged and submerged several times during their long history.
THE INNER ISLANDS
The inner islands of the Seychelles Bank. These include the world’s only oceanic islands of granitic rock together with two small coral sand cays. The granite islands are the world’s oldest ocean islands, isolated in the Indian Ocean for 65 million years ago.