The khoums (singular and plural in English; ; ) is the subdivisory unit of the Mauritanian monetary system, the ouguiya. Five khoums make an ouguiya, hence one khoums can be expressed as 0.2 ouguiya. When the ouguiya was adapted in 1973, it replaced the

CFA franc CFA franc (, ) is the name of two currencies used by 210 million people (as of 2023) in fourteen African countries: the West African CFA franc (where "CFA" stands for , i.e. "African Financial Community" in English), used in eight West African c ...

as 5 francs to the ouguiya, thus a khoums was equal to the franc. As the franc had no subdivisional unit, all wealths in francs could be converted to ouigiya with no rounding. On the khoums coin (minted in Kremnica Mint,

Slovakia Slovakia, officially the Slovak Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the west, and the Czech Republic to the northwest. Slovakia's m ...

), the obverse is in

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

with the date of the

Islamic calendar The Hijri calendar (), also known in English as the Islamic calendar, is a lunar calendar consisting of 12 lunar months in a year of 354 or 355 days. It is used to determine the proper days of Islamic holidays and rituals, such as the Ramad ...

and the reverse in French in the

Gregorian calendar The Gregorian calendar is the calendar used in most parts of the world. It went into effect in October 1582 following the papal bull issued by Pope Gregory XIII, which introduced it as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian cale ...

with national arms on each side, identical to all other Mauritanian coins. However, on the Arabic side, instead of a

number A number is a mathematical object used to count, measure, and label. The most basic examples are the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, and so forth. Numbers can be represented in language with number words. More universally, individual numbers can ...

like on the other coins, the word is used. The khoums is one of only two subdivisions of currency that are not in a multiple of ten, and the only one still in everyday use; the other is the Malagasy

iraimbilanja The iraimbilanja (singular and plural) is the divisory currency unit of Madagascar, being equal to one fifth of an ariary. Etymology Iraimbilanja means literally "one iron weight" and was the name of an old coin worth of an ariary. Value Th ...

, also based on the

franc The franc is any of various units of currency. One franc is typically divided into 100 centimes. The name is said to derive from the Latin inscription ''francorum rex'' (King of the Franks) used on early French coins and until the 18th century ...

. the value of one khoums is about

US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...

0.0054347846/ ¢0.54347846.

References

Economy of Mauritania {{Money-unit-stub