{ "Introduction": { "Background": { "text": "
A land of vast distances and rich natural resources, Canada became a self-governing dominion in 1867, while retaining ties to the British crown. Canada gained legislative independence from Britain in 1931 and formalized its constitutional independence from the UK when it passed the Canada Act in 1982. Economically and technologically, the nation has developed in parallel with the US, its neighbor to the south across the world's longest international border. Canada faces the political challenges of meeting public demands for quality improvements in health care, education, social services, and economic competitiveness, as well as responding to the particular concerns of predominantly francophone Quebec. Canada also aims to develop its diverse energy resources while maintaining its commitment to the environment.
" } }, "Geography": { "Location": { "text": "Northern North America, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean on the east, North Pacific Ocean on the west, and the Arctic Ocean on the north, north of the conterminous US" }, "Geographic coordinates": { "text": "60 00 N, 95 00 W" }, "Map references": { "text": "North America" }, "Area": { "total": { "text": "9,984,670 sq km" }, "land": { "text": "9,093,507 sq km" }, "water": { "text": "891,163 sq km" } }, "Area - comparative": { "text": "slightly larger than the US" }, "Land boundaries": { "total": { "text": "8,891 km" }, "border countries": { "text": "US 8,891 km (includes 2,475 km with Alaska)" }, "note": "note: Canada is the world's largest country that borders only one country" }, "Coastline": { "text": "202,080 km", "note": "note: the Canadian Arctic Archipelago - consisting of 36,563 islands, several of them some of the world's largest - contributes to Canada easily having the longest coastline in the world" }, "Maritime claims": { "territorial sea": { "text": "12 nm" }, "contiguous zone": { "text": "24 nm" }, "exclusive economic zone": { "text": "200 nm" }, "continental shelf": { "text": "200 nm or to the edge of the continental margin" } }, "Climate": { "text": "varies from temperate in south to subarctic and arctic in north" }, "Terrain": { "text": "mostly plains with mountains in west, lowlands in southeast" }, "Elevation": { "highest point": { "text": "Mount Logan 5,959 m" }, "lowest point": { "text": "Atlantic/Pacific/Arctic Oceans 0 m" }, "mean elevation": { "text": "487 m" } }, "Natural resources": { "text": "bauxite, iron ore, nickel, zinc, copper, gold, lead, uranium, rare earth elements, molybdenum, potash, diamonds, silver, fish, timber, wildlife, coal, petroleum, natural gas, hydropower" }, "Land use": { "agricultural land": { "text": "6.8% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: arable land": { "text": "arable land: 4.7% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: permanent crops": { "text": "permanent crops: 0.5% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: permanent pasture": { "text": "permanent pasture: 1.6% (2018 est.)" }, "forest": { "text": "34.1% (2018 est.)" }, "other": { "text": "59.1% (2018 est.)" } }, "Irrigated land": { "text": "9,045 sq km (2015)" }, "Major lakes (area sq km)": { "fresh water lake(s)": { "text": "Huron* - 35,972 sq km; Great Bear Lake - 31,328 sq km; Superior* - 28,754 sq km; Great Slave Lake - 28,568 sq km; Lake Winnipeg - 24,387 sq km; Erie* - 12,776 sq km; Ontario* - 9,790 sq km; Lake Athabasca - 7,935 sq km; Reindeer Lake - 6,650 sq km; Nettilling Lake - 5,542 sq kmcontinuous permafrost in north is a serious obstacle to development; cyclonic storms form east of the Rocky Mountains, a result of the mixing of air masses from the Arctic, Pacific, and North American interior, and produce most of the country's rain and snow east of the mountains
volcanism: the vast majority of volcanoes in Western Canada's Coast Mountains remain dormant
" }, "Geography - note": { "text": "note 1: second-largest country in world (after Russia) and largest in the Americas; strategic location between Russia and US via north polar route; approximately 90% of the population is concentrated within 160 km (100 mi) of the US border
note 2: Canada has more fresh water than any other country and almost 9% of Canadian territory is water; Canada has at least 2 million and possibly over 3 million lakes - that is more than all other countries combined
" } }, "People and Society": { "Population": { "text": "38,516,736 (2023 est.)" }, "Nationality": { "noun": { "text": "Canadian(s)" }, "adjective": { "text": "Canadian" } }, "Ethnic groups": { "text": "Canadian 15.6%, English 14.7%, Scottish 12.1%, French 11%, Irish 12.1%, German 8.1%, Chinese 4.7%, Italian 4.3%, First Nations 1.7%, Indian 3.7%, Ukrainian 3.5%, Metis 1.5% (2021 est.)", "note": "note: percentages add up to more than 100% because respondents were able to identify more than one ethnic origin" }, "Languages": { "Languages": { "text": "English (official) 87.1%, French (official) 29.1%, Chinese languages 4.2%, Spanish 3.2%, Punjabi 2.6%, Arabic 2.4%, Tagalog 2.3%, Italian 1.5% (2022 est.)" }, "major-language sample(s)": { "text": "note: on 22 March 2023, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a Travel Alert for polio in North America; Canada is currently considered a high risk to travelers for circulating vaccine-derived polioviruses (cVDPV); vaccine-derived poliovirus (VDPV) is a strain of the weakened poliovirus that was initially included in oral polio vaccine (OPV) and that has changed over time and behaves more like the wild or naturally occurring virus; this means it can be spread more easily to people who are unvaccinated against polio and who come in contact with the stool or respiratory secretions, such as from a sneeze, of an “infected” person who received oral polio vaccine; the CDC recommends that before any international travel, anyone unvaccinated, incompletely vaccinated, or with an unknown polio vaccination status should complete the routine polio vaccine series; before travel to any high-risk destination, the CDC recommends that adults who previously completed the full, routine polio vaccine series receive a single, lifetime booster dose of polio vaccine
" }, "Obesity - adult prevalence rate": { "text": "29.4% (2016)" }, "Alcohol consumption per capita": { "total": { "text": "8 liters of pure alcohol (2019 est.)" }, "beer": { "text": "3.5 liters of pure alcohol (2019 est.)" }, "wine": { "text": "2 liters of pure alcohol (2019 est.)" }, "spirits": { "text": "2.1 liters of pure alcohol (2019 est.)" }, "other alcohols": { "text": "0.4 liters of pure alcohol (2019 est.)" } }, "Tobacco use": { "total": { "text": "13% (2020 est.)" }, "male": { "text": "15.3% (2020 est.)" }, "female": { "text": "10.7% (2020 est.)" } }, "Children under the age of 5 years underweight": { "text": "NA" }, "Currently married women (ages 15-49)": { "text": "52.2% (2023 est.)" }, "Education expenditures": { "text": "5.2% of GDP (2020 est.)" }, "Literacy": { "total population": { "text": "NA" }, "male": { "text": "NA" }, "female": { "text": "NA" } }, "School life expectancy (primary to tertiary education)": { "total": { "text": "17 years" }, "male": { "text": "16 years" }, "female": { "text": "17 years (2020)" } }, "Youth unemployment rate (ages 15-24)": { "total": { "text": "14%" }, "male": { "text": "15%" }, "female": { "text": "13.1% (2021 est.)" } } }, "Environment": { "Environment - current issues": { "text": "metal smelting, coal-burning utilities, and vehicle emissions impacting agricultural and forest productivity; air pollution and resulting acid rain severely affecting lakes and damaging forests; ocean waters becoming contaminated due to agricultural, industrial, mining, and forestry activities" }, "Environment - international agreements": { "party to": { "text": "Air Pollution, Air Pollution-Heavy Metals, Air Pollution-Multi-effect Protocol, Air Pollution-Nitrogen Oxides, Air Pollution-Persistent Organic Pollutants, Air Pollution-Sulphur 85, Air Pollution-Sulphur 94, Antarctic-Environmental Protection, Antarctic-Marine Living Resources, Antarctic Treaty, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Climate Change-Paris Agreement, Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban, Desertification, Endangered Species, Environmental Modification, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Marine Dumping-London Convention, Marine Dumping-London Protocol, Nuclear Test Ban, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands" }, "signed, but not ratified": { "text": "Air Pollution-Volatile Organic Compounds, Marine Life Conservation" } }, "Climate": { "text": "varies from temperate in south to subarctic and arctic in north" }, "Land use": { "agricultural land": { "text": "6.8% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: arable land": { "text": "arable land: 4.7% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: permanent crops": { "text": "permanent crops: 0.5% (2018 est.)" }, "agricultural land: permanent pasture": { "text": "permanent pasture: 1.6% (2018 est.)" }, "forest": { "text": "34.1% (2018 est.)" }, "other": { "text": "59.1% (2018 est.)" } }, "Urbanization": { "urban population": { "text": "81.9% of total population (2023)" }, "rate of urbanization": { "text": "0.95% annual rate of change (2020-25 est.)" } }, "Revenue from forest resources": { "text": "0.08% of GDP (2018 est.)" }, "Revenue from coal": { "text": "0.08% of GDP (2018 est.)" }, "Air pollutants": { "particulate matter emissions": { "text": "6.48 micrograms per cubic meter (2016 est.)" }, "carbon dioxide emissions": { "text": "544.89 megatons (2016 est.)" }, "methane emissions": { "text": "101.82 megatons (2020 est.)" } }, "Waste and recycling": { "municipal solid waste generated annually": { "text": "25,103,034 tons (2014 est.)" }, "municipal solid waste recycled annually": { "text": "5,168,715 tons (2008 est.)" }, "percent of municipal solid waste recycled": { "text": "20.6% (2008 est.)" } }, "Major lakes (area sq km)": { "fresh water lake(s)": { "text": "Huron* - 35,972 sq km; Great Bear Lake - 31,328 sq km; Superior* - 28,754 sq km; Great Slave Lake - 28,568 sq km; Lake Winnipeg - 24,387 sq km; Erie* - 12,776 sq km; Ontario* - 9,790 sq km; Lake Athabasca - 7,935 sq km; Reindeer Lake - 6,650 sq km; Nettilling Lake - 5,542 sq kmmanaged maritime boundary disputes with the US at Dixon Entrance, Beaufort Sea, Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the Gulf of Maine, including the disputed Machias Seal Island and North Rock; Canada and the United States dispute how to divide the Beaufort Sea and the status of the Northwest Passage but continue to work cooperatively to survey the Arctic continental shelf; US works closely with Canada to intensify security measures for monitoring and controlling legal and illegal movement of people, transport, and commodities across the international border; sovereignty dispute with Denmark over Hans Island in the Kennedy Channel between Ellesmere Island and Greenland; commencing the collection of technical evidence for submission to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in support of claims for continental shelf beyond 200 nm from its declared baselines in the Arctic, as stipulated in Article 76, paragraph 8, of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea
" }, "Refugees and internally displaced persons": { "refugees (country of origin)": { "text": "22,400 (Venezuela) (refugees and migrants) (2020); 5,254 (Iran) (mid-year 2021)" }, "stateless persons": { "text": "4,323 (2022)" } }, "Illicit drugs": { "text": "transnational criminal organizations trafficked cocaine, opium, methamphetamine, other synthetic drugs, and prescription drugs (some of which transited the United States) to Canada for domestic consumption; a source of synthetic drugs (including synthetic opioids), cannabis, and MDMA trafficked to the United States; a major source of precursor or essential chemicals used in the production of illicit narcotics
" } } }